Emma had, of course, been the first to arrive on the beach donning the swimsuit she'd purchased from D.C. She started setting up, anchoring an umbrella into the soft sand and then unfolding a chair underneath it. Beside her was a cooler- snacks and drinks of both the alcoholic and non-alcoholic variety, likely more than they'd need.

She took her seat, looking over the empty beach. Hopefully it wouldn’t be empty for long. She wasn’t ignorant to the infighting in Unit B. Hell, she was involved in some of it. Something like this… she’d hoped that it would help bring them together, although she wasn’t ignorant to the fact that a day at the beach wouldn’t make everyone friends.

Maybe no one was coming after all.

Then suddenly, a chord from an electric guitar.

Three silhouettes came into view as the riffs continued, the song revealing itself to be the opening to Thin Lizzy's 'The Boys Are Back In Town'. Confident strides carried the reunited Team 'Splattered Across the Penthouse' to the party, the source of the anthem revealing itself to be an overclocked, glowing stereothat rested on Brent's bare shoulder. Three boys walking in complete sync to a beach party. It might have actually been impressive if Ernie, and by extension his bright green Crocs, hadn't started tiptoeing once they entered the sandier area. The buzzcut boy grimaced slightly as fragmented seashells and tiny rocks made their way into his shoes, the tennis net he had over his shoulders swinging wildly as he hopped to shake them out.

The slow motion shot of Team SAP crossing the beach, while still impressive, was ruined slightly as Ernie gingerly stepped over the beach. Marcus gave Ernie a confused side-look as he started breaking formation, culminating in a complete incredulous look. Slowly, the words could be seen forming on Marcus's lips: "Are you serio-" but that was as far as he got before a tennis net beaned him across the back of the head, causing him to drop the folded tables he'd been tasked with carrying.

And, just like that, those folded tables fell on Brent's big toe, a painful thunk sounding, before electrifying agony shot up his spine. "Motherf-" the arbiter spat, before the overclocked stereo, buffed three times as an experiment to see how long it could last, sputtered. The music warped, twisted, garbled, and soon the speakers were blasting out white noise instead, all as he tried not to drop the damned thing on Ernie's head while simultaneously trying to dig his foot out from under the fallen table.

Still on one foot to get the granules out of his footwear, Ernie looked up in confusion as the music warped. Brent's wild swaying prompted the Aberration to lean away and as a result he tripped over completely, ultimately getting sand all over his precious shoes. The tennis net stuck upwards like a flagpole while the sunscreen mega-bottle he was holding tumbled onto the ground.

A mouthed apology from Marcus to Brent as he gathered up the few tables he'd been able to carry around, and he relinquished the vile thing's hold on Brent's toe, trying desperately to not end up a casualty of either a stereo or a damned tennis net.

Another burst of sparks from the strangled stereo, and Brent made a quick decision. Before the whole thing could explode on top of them, the arbiter hurled the stereo away, the silver circuitry that empowered the object leaving as soon as it was no longer resting on his broad, muscled shoulders. With that, another screeching cry sounded as the object shrunk, reverting into the tragically small Walkman Team SAP had found in the shed, before bursting into flames.

"Urgh," Ernie sputtered out a mouthful of sand from his faceplant, "It really does get everywhere."

"Man," Brent shook his head, offering Ernie a hand, "We really should have taken the jeep. You said you knew how to do donuts, yah?"

"Backwards with my eyes closed? Uh-duh." He took the hand gratefully, brushing himself off before picking up the tennis net again.

"What? Were you not expecting the sand on the beach?" Marcus said, giving a half irritated/half amused look to Ernie.

"I-I was! Just...not so much of it," Ernie mumbled in embarrassment. He could barely remember anything of the last time he went to the beach. Desperate to change the subject, he called out to Emma, "Hey, we brought the stuff!"

Emma watched the group’s approach with barely suppressed laughter. When Ernie called out she responded with a small wave, ”Thanks, boys!” she shouted out, getting up and heading towards them. ”By the way, ten outta ten on that entrance. Impressive stuff, really.” she said deadpan, voice conveying none of the sarcasm that obviously went with her statement.

Ernie merely cringed and walked off to set up the net. The sunscreen bottle dropped itself by Emma's station.

"You think? What sold it for you, the numerous injuries we sustained, the fireworks show, or Ernie's neon green Crocs?" Marcus said, deliberately directing the last part to Ernie.

"Please," Brent said, picking up the busted Walkman from the sand, "If that's what you think a fireworks show is, I'll be revealing a true pyrotechnic miracle later. Knock your speedo right off."

"It's not..." Marcus started, fluttering his shirt slightly to look down at his own swim trunks, before catching onto Brent. "Hardy harr." he added in response, resisting the urge to stick his tongue out like a child.

"Shoulda just worn boots or somethin'," Ernie muttered, glaring down at his Crocs. They were comfy at least. And he liked the colour.

”Ooooh, big plan, Brent? Looking forward to it.” Emma gave a small sigh, ignoring the banter of the others and focusing in on the mention of a fireworks show, ”Of course the loss of our radio does put a bit of a damper on things, but oh well… let’s start setting up these tables.”

Angélique had found it strange that someone like Emma had managed to find her phone number and send her a text message. Maybe it had been Ernest? Or was it Allison? She didn’t know, but the most surprising thing was the invitation she got among the mass invite text sent to everyone in Unit B to assemble at the beach for a party.

As much as the Aberration didn’t like Emma, Angel was willing to accept that the girl had a great idea. Hopefully it would go better than the last time everyone tried to party, thinking back on how drunk she was and how the guys had help from Kadabra lest they all would’ve ended shot by the local police department. Getting into her fancy swimsuit she had bought way back from Crimen Culpae, the singer was now dressed up appropriately for a beach party. Adjusting the straps of her bikini, Angel swung her guitar case over her shoulder and headed towards the beach.

It was with a swaying gait reflecting pride and sex appeal, raven hair fluttering in the wind that a girl and her guitar appeared on the beach, sporting her usual shades and a black bikini mostly tailored to impress and enhance the feminine curves on the fallen idol's well-toned body, using straps that crossed over her body, either circling her waist or the upper and lower parts of her chest with Xs. Whether it was because Angélique wanted to be dressed to impress or simply because she loved to dress herself in revealing extravagant clothing, it was a rare sight for a lot to see the girl without actual pants covering her lower body, and the tattoo on her back depicting feathery wings clearly revealed.

But all this sensual entry was lost upon the poor fools that had already gathered on the beach. As she arrived, she found the pitiful form of Team SAP fumbling around with their equipment like incompetent idiots while Emma was overlooking them.

Deep inside, Angélique's heart sank when she took notice that the only people that had showed up as for the moment had been mostly people she wasn't on good terms with. While the weeks had gone by and Angel started to look for the better, she was still retaining a feeling of resentment towards Ernest and Brent, overshadowing greatly her disliking towards Emma.

Calm down. No one will be causing shit in a party Emma organized...

Walking up to where Emma was, Angélique mustered an earnest smile as she approached the girl and the cooler. “Hello Emma. Thanks for throwing up a party. I guess we really needed that, huh?” Angélique gave the girl a look through the edge of her shades as she bent down to grab a beer. It was awkward, but Angel figured she might put her rivalries aside for today and keep a friendly attitude with everyone around. She couldn’t ruin a perfect moment for everyone to mingle and have fun, right?

Emma gave Angel a quick nod. ”Yep. Seemed like a good idea. I’m sure everyone could use it.” Emma’s voice revealed none of the animosity she may or may not have felt for Angel, instead sounding perfectly amicable.

"Hey! A plan every occasion!" Marcus said, giving Angel a quick wave and jokingly giving her a low whistle. The fact that Emma was right there was not something he thought about until moments after.

Brent gave his friend a quick 'dude, even I'm not that retarded' look, before glancing over towards Emma.

"Buddy..." Ernie raised an eyebrow, more thrown off by his friend's taste in women than the fact he had a girlfriend.

Marcus returned the look with a tense one of his own, which brought across the message 'Oh god I was not even thinking; I'm a dead man, remember me as I was'.

Emma, perfectly on cue, gave Marcus a sharp glance. ”Nice.” she hissed quickly with a frustrated groan.

Marcus looked sheepishly back at her, forming his hands into a small heart shape and giving a quick air-smoochums in her direction.

Returning Brent's wave with a curt nod, Angel glanced back at Emma "Definitively a good idea." she admitted as she suddenly felt surrounded by the others. "Ah... yes. I didn't expect something that could broadcast music to be available for us to use, so I planned to bring my guitar just in case. Glad it turned out to be a good idea after all." the raven-haired Aberration replied to Marcus' comment, oblivious to the true meaning behind his remark.

"Beach busking?" Ernie remarked as he struggled with the net, "Just cos you dress like a homeless tramp don't mean you gotta act like one."

"You do it like this," Brent walked over, escaping the disgusting display of kicked puppy Marcus to help with the nets. "And dude, take it easy. The few buskers I know were all doing fairly aight."

"Oh boy, I need to take you to Reno sometime."

Angel quirked up an eyebrow in confusion. Tramp? What the hell was his problem? She was just wearing a swimsuit like everyone else. Hell, the only thing different she had to hers compared to Emma's was just a few more straps adorning the bikiniwear. While she'd gladly give him a mouthful piece of her mind, she wasn't there for that today.

"If you have nothing intelligent to say, enjoy the party with your friends. I'm not here to spoil the day with a misplaced attitude and endure yours." Angel glared at Ernie through her shades before walking off, finding a quiet spot on the beach to sit and enjoy her beer without being assaulted by idiots.

Ernie really did have nothing intelligent to say. With a final huff, he shouted after her, "Stay away from my donuts next time!"

Emma glanced at both Ernie and Angel. Now they were fighting too? It seemed that there was a new rivalry every week. She pushed past it, ”Alright. Tables. Snacks on the tables, since people are starting to come.” Emma said quickly, trying to calm the situation.

"Yes. Tables. Very important." Marcus said, starting to busy himself with getting the tables actually assembled, rather than just throwing them on the beach to collect sand. He as much wanted to be in Emma's good graces as he wanted to just stay away from whatever hostile mess this was turning out to be, so he quickly began the process of setup.

Chris entered the scene with his black swim trunks and bare, sandy feet. Hands were in his pockets as he approached the group. He didn't mind Brent so much after their little chat, but after that incident with Marcus that sense of guilt had returned to him. He didn't let any of that show, as he just kept his usual ice-cold expression. No smile or frown, but his eyes were piercing as if he was slightly pissed off or annoyed, something that he imagined the other students would be used to seeing by now anyway. He didn't feel obligated to say much, part of him felt like he shouldn't even be here. He had unfolded his beach stare and placed his seat near, but not too close, to the others. His eyes found themselves staring towards the ocean rather then the party.

Emma tried her best to match Chris’s obvious gloom with cheer, giving the boy a wave. He was Chris, right? The dragon? She hadn’t really gotten to talk to him. She gave Marcus a small glance, turning away from the snack table and walking over towards Chris. ”Hey! Chris, right? I don’t think we’ve really… formally met, but I’ve heard your name enough times to remember it. I’m Emma.” she said, extending a hand towards the boy who obviously wanted no part in the festivities.

Marcus had managed to finagle one of the tables into position by the same he noticed Chris. A stern expression fell over his face as calculating eyes followed the white haired boy. He looked in surprise when Emma walked past him and towards Chris, and followed slightly, staying a fair distance away. His arms crossed, he just watched as Emma introduced herself. He bent over once to rub the front of his leg, as if he were scratching an itch. A fairly unsubstantial action, but Chris would probably get the message as Marcus stood back up to his full height and recrossed his arms.

"Right, thanks for the invite." He said as polite as he could without seeming too interested in the conversation, and he shook her hand casually before having it retreat to his pocket. "I'm not much of a social butterfly, if Angelique hadn't been so damn good with her motivational speeches I probably wouldn't have come." His gaze fixed back towards the ocean. "I just hope that this will serve as a nice distraction from all the chaos thats been happening, at least." By a glance he noticed Marcus's leg, and that guilt eating at this stomach only grew. Pale, if it was even possible to notice from his complexion.

”Right. Well, uh… glad you’re here. Feel free to join us if you want.” Emma gave him a half smile before turning around and subsequently noticing Marcus standing a ways behind her.

"Oh, Chris, what a surprise!" Standing from the now assembled nets, Brent patted the sand off his knees, waving at the skinny pasty little dragon boy. "Angelic's over there, if you came for her and all."

"And put on some damn sunblock. You look like the kind of guy that reddens like crabshell," Ernie reminded him loudly.

Emma started to walk back towards Marcus, ”Everything alright?” she said quietly, quiet enough that the others wouldn’t hear.

"Hmm?" Marcus hummed, feigning ignorance. He paused for a moment, the second or two he believed was necessary for the charade, before surprise seemed to shock him. "Oh! I pinched my finger in the table just now." he lied, shaking his hand slightly.

”Uh, alright. Well, let’s get back to it. The people demand snacks!” she said, heading back towards her cooler and pulling out assorted varieties of chips, sliced watermelon, fruit salad, cookies (homemade, if she was going to boast, although she did get one of the maids to help her), and, last but not least, pretzels. This was all supplemented by ice cream which, for obvious reasons, would remain in the cooler. At that she carefully began to lay them out on the tables, dumping the snacks into bowls.

"'Demand' is a strong word, but 'appreciate' would probably suffice." Marcus quipped, helping Emma with the snacks, sneaking one or two when the opportunity presented itself.

On her lonesome side of the party, Angélique sighed faintly at what was happening around. It really did feel like this party started to become another reason for everyone to duke it out in front of everyone. Taking another sip of her beer, the woman started to slowly open her guitar case. Maybe she'll play something after that bottle. Feels like it'll make the whole thing more bearable.

Chris waved back at Brent but disregarding his comment. He shook his head to Ernie. "No, my powers don't let me get burned." A lie, that was only true in his dragon form. He knew that well enough, and he'd surely blister out in the sun, but he didn't want to protect himself from the rays. Rather, he felt like he deserved that kind of punishment, and perhaps that form of pain might improve his ability, in some weird way; Thats what he imagined at least.

Ernie shrugged with a casual, "Suit yourself. I brought aloe too, if anyone needs it later."

Brent noticed that. Noticed and decided he wouldn't forget it. For now though, forgiveness was free and high in supply. "Cool," he nodded, "Gonna work up a nice tan before winter hits, eh?"

"Trust me I'm enjoying every bit of the heat I can before I start having the habit of being locked in my room with several sheets of blankets and jackets to keep me comfortable."

"Can you even get cold if you breathe fire?"

"Its not as if I have a fire constantly burning in my belly, if I had to spam my breath attack just to keep warm I'd pass out before freezing. I could make a fire to keep myself warm but inside? That's gonna be one hell of a mess to clean up." He smirked as he tried to pass some humor in his words.

Marcus jumped a little, looking around over to where Angel was sat, and gave her a puzzled, yet perfectly innocent look. There was no bullshit happening here, no sir-ee. At least, none that he thought Angel was aware of. He turned back to the snack bowl, nearly fumbling a pretzel as he did so. "Nope. No roasting today, unfortunately."

"Ain't no beach party without a camp fire and kebabs though."

"Kebabs? Usually we just do hotdogs where I'm from." Marcus said, finally looking up from his numerous bowls.

Chris's stomach churned, and once again he looked towards the crashing waves ahead of him. Trying to find distance in this turmoil. Why can't I just die already.

No, it is only fitting that he should be burned, for burning a teammate."Well I could start a fire if you guys decide to cook something." Chris added, both trying to ignore the shame burning him and Ernie's attempt at saving him from his own sense of justice.

"Oh, that sounds like a blast," Brent turned, "Ernie, you remember if they got logs stacked up by the shed?"

"Definitely do," Ernie brushed some more sand out of his Crocs. Right now he needed that third coat of block. He moved to the snack station, "Yeah, I can go up and grab some later. Maybe when it gets darker?"

”Awesome. Hot dogs sound awesome.” Emma decided, ”That’s a my bad. Should’ve thought of a grill, but we’ve got a dragon, so I guess we’re good.” Emma was clearly oblivious to the quiet fight that was happening before her.

Yes you have a monster that hasn't been slayed yet."Well I'm just happy I can be useful."

In the background, Marcus quietly choked on a piece of watermelon. He kept his mouth shut though, if only because it was too easy.

"Oh, could you get your bigger man to carry the logs then, Emma?" Brent asked, "Planning on getting some oil and other stuff on my side. Try out this Chinese hot dog thing I read on the net."

”Hmmm? You mean Determination? I asked if he wanted to take a trip to the beach, but he didn’t seem too interested…” Emma didn’t pause to consider that Brent might not be aware of Determination’s new-found sentience.

"Determination?" Chris asked, both curious and looking for a change in subject.

"Lovely kid," Ernie commented, chewing on something from the table. He was only slightly disappointed that the tulpa wouldn't show, "Huh, these cookies aren't bad."

”Oh. My, uh, summon. The shadow guy. Big one, hard to miss.” Emma told Chris with a small nod before shooting out a quick, ”Thanks! Made them myself!” to Ernie. He responded with a quick thumbs up.

"It's...It's conscious?" Chris said, a hint of fear laced in his still curious intrigued.

Oh, shit. Yeah, she totally forgot that almost no one knew about that. ”Oh… uh, yeah. He started talking a couple weeks ago. It’s… weird, I’m aware.” she replied with a hint of discomfort.

"Real wierd." Marcus muttered mostly to himself, snagging one of the cookies after Ernie complimented them.

"Wait, so..." Brent paused, before beaming. "Woah, that's real weird, but that's real cool! So does he still like, listen to you? Or do you have to negotiate everything now? And hey, that means you have like...actually, totally infinite range, now, right? Don't even need voice range now! Damn, Emma, every time. Hella rad developments."

”I mean, I have to ask, but yeah, he’s pretty much down to do the same stuff… except dying. But, uh, since I’m kind of the only thing keeping him alive he’ll still do the whole ‘fighting’ thing when we’re in trouble. And I guess he can interpret shit now, instead of doing everything literally, which is helpful.” Emma finally took a seat, grabbing a beer as she did.

Was his dragon form conscious too? Some kind of parasite just waiting to consume him? He recalled D.C. again, the voice that spoke to him before freezing him to near-death. '..why..' why

"....I don't..want to freak anyone out or anything but..." A hesitation, he had already told Angelique this, but perhaps letting the others know about such details might be useful in the future. In any case, he had difficulty keeping it in. "One of the monsters in D.C. talked to me, briefly."

"From what I saw, you got your ass kicked fairly effectively. Sure you weren't just hallucinating or something? Tends to happen with blood loss and concussions."

"Marc..." came the whisper again.

Ernie snickered and offered Marcus a hi five under the table. He didn't have any particular beef with Chris but it was kinda funny to see Marcus ragging on people like that.

Marcus jumped as Ernie's hand lovingly brushed against his leg under the table and Angel chastized in his ear, but he returned the subtle high five. He wasn't exactly sure what Angel's problem was, but he just turned to give her a quick questioning look when it appeared nobody else was paying attention.

"I know about it. Stop stirring more trouble while we're trying ot have a good time. It's tense enough already."

Marcus gave a quick thumbs up behind his back, and if it was possible to make a hand gesture seem sarcastic, he tried his hardest to do it here.

"Thanks."

"Wait," Brent arched an eyebrow at that. "Wasn't that just a subnatural? Yah sure it was a monster, dude? Looked like a girl through the binoculars and all."

"It didn't sound..." He paused. "I just hope you're right....but even if it was a subnatural..it didn't make any sense with what it said...right before it froze me solid and nearly killed me...Why? One word, in what sounded like...uncertainty, confusion maybe? Like, it wasn't expecting me to charge at it or something..or maybe it was sorrow, I don't...I don't know how to interpret that voice..." He regained his composure. "Maybe the stress just made me imagine things...I'm sorry I didn't mean to get off track like that.."

"I mean, I'd be confused too if someone charged into certain death headfirst like that. Takes guts," Ernie said thoughtfully.

"Well, wouldn't be surprised if they could talk," Brent shrugged, "The DC gang IS annoyingly smart, for whatever reason."

"No it wasn't...It wasn't like that kind of confusion...It felt... He struggled to find the words to describe what the hell he had heard. It was so brief, and it felt so..distant maybe, emotionless? "I'm sorry, can we change the subject? The thought of it just...creeps me out is all.."

"Put some sunblock on and we can," Ernie reminded him again. He turned to the rest of the guests, "You guys too."

He was reluctant, but the sole conviction of changing the subject was enough to put a rest to his inner loathings and apply the sunscreen on his pale skin. Since he was already up, he helped himself to some snacks as well.

"Don't forget your neck and shoulders while you're at it," the Aberration yawned lazily, plucking another pretzel from the bowl.

"Eh, I'm fine on my side," Brent said, waving away the offer, "Anyone down for beach volleyball? Gotta work up an appetite before we bring out the meat."

"Nah, I was gonna..." Marcus started, giving Chris a glare and moving over near Brent as he approached. He stopped suddenly though, snapping his fingers in frustration. "Dammit! I was gonna see if there was a board up at the estate."

He looked back towards the direction of the house, as if mentaly calculating the distance and time it would take to travel. It wasn't a lot, but it was more effort than he wanted to put in. But those waves looked so nice - they were practically calling out to him.

Ernie considered it. If anything, he needed stuff to be taken back to the estate. "Maybe a proper stereo? Yeah Brent, I'll play you."

Chris moved a bit away from Marcus, but tried to avoid making it obvious as he munched on a few pretzels. "I could use a game or two."

”I’m fine spectating!” Emma called out to Brent, taking another swig from her bottle, ”You can check if the big guy wants to come down, but beyond that I’m good.” she said to Marcus.

"I'm gonna let you guys impress us." Angélique called out calmly, her magic-enabled voice reaching out to everyone on the beach before taking another sip of her beer. She had no desire to actually involve herself in a game with those two.

"Not playing to impress you, lady," Ernie returned in an equally calm tone before finally gathering the courage to run out in bare feet. Not that he could impress anyone in the first place. He was notoriously bad at ball sports.

Angel only grumbled quietly at the answer. Was it so hard to just say something without it being coated in venom?

Emma had begun to fall asleep in her chair by now, beer bottle handing loosely between her finger tips but thankfully not falling. Unfortunately, she forgot to put on sunscreen.

Lily stepped onto the sand in a pastel pink bikini, showcasing a slim body that wasn't as child like as people would expect from the small girl. As the warm sand touched her bare toes, she giggled. "I'm sure it'll be fun. If it's not, well, we can just go back in and laze around," Lily said as she tugged at Sophia's hand, urging her shy friend to step into the sand with her. Her other hand had a violin case in it, a back up in case she herself got bored hanging out in the beach. Having no memories of ever going to one, she figured that it was a good place as any to play music. Her golden eyes that were twinkling with excitement scanned the area, noting the people that were already there. Marcus, Chris...Her grin faltered a little when she spotted Ernie but it grew wide when she saw Angelique. Emma looked like she had dozed off. Brent was there too and she made a mental note to thank him for the treats he and Ernie left for her when she found a chance.

Sophia nodded at Lily's words as they arrived, scanning the beach apprehensively. It had taken a good amount of convincing before Sophia had agreed to come, for though she had been doing pretty much nothing the past few days, she still would have preferred to remain in her room. Or in the library. Tugging a bit at the swimsuit provided, she frowned. She recognized Angélique, who was someone she had failed talking with. She recognized Brent, someone who she had not wanted to see again or talk to again. She saw the person with whom she had gone panic mode then blabber mode then no talking mode on all within a short amount of time. She wasn't sure about the rest of the people.

With a sigh, Sophia gripped Lily's hand tighter for a moment before letting go. "Ok, let's go." She began to walk down the beach towards the area where the tables and nets had been put up.

Lily squeezed Sophia's hand back and then gave her a wide grin when she let go. "See? It's not as bad as it looks right? We're gonna have fun!" she said as she followed after her shy friend.

An unconvincing hum was all Lily got as a reply, but at least Sophia continued to walk.

Having failed to talk her way out of the whole thing, Zoe had eventually allowed herself to be dragged outside. Despite having no intention of entering the water, she'd donned a swimsuit anyway - mostly because the redhead was the type that would take any excuse to show off her physique. As the beach came into view, she frowned. "You know what, I think I forgot something. You guys can go ahead, I'll just--"

Lawrence (Garbed ridiculously in a combination of his usual long sleeved button down combined with swimming trunks, legs bare of any tattoos yet covered with scars in various stages of healing) cut her off with a hand on her shoulder and a tight squeeze. He himself had grown more irritated as the prospective beach day approached- while he had no fear of the water like his current companion, he did despise parties. Or really any social functions. Yet here he was, and he would be damned if he was going to let his partner in misery back out at the last second.

“We're already here Zoe. If I have to drag you the last distance we're doing this. For the team, remember.”

The last bit was said through gritted teeth, and sounded less convincing than any statement he'd ever made in his life.

"...worth a try." Zoe muttered, continuing out of a sense of obligation rather than any desire to go to the damn beach. Despite her complaints, she supposed she had agreed to this, and at least her companion didn't seem much happier about this than she was. On some level, she knew she'd have to get used to being near water - even if she wasn't going to be swimming, freezing up around it in a fight would be a bad idea. Catching sight of several figures, on the sand, she sighed.

"Looks like we're not the first ones here." At least no-one seemed to be in the water, so there wouldn't be any pressure to join them.

“Are you surprised with how much we've been dragging our feet?”

That, and the entire walk there had been a dog forcing itself between them whenever the gap seemed large enough, running off again when a new potential source of food presented itself before repeating the process from the beginning.

"Kind of hoped more people would ditch it." Because that would have given them an excuse to leave, more than anything. Almost tripping over Lizzy as the dog darted between them once more, Zoe raised an eyebrow and glanced down at her with a sigh before continuing. "Guess we should head over, huh? They'll spot us eventually."

As Lawrence removed his hand from her shoulder with a sigh, Zoe walked on ahead to approach the group with one last apprehensive glance at the ocean. A confident expression on her face as she reached them, she looked at the assorted classmates. She didn't exactly like all of them, but it could always be worse. "Hey there. Sorry we're late - nice setup you've got going, though."

Chris glanced towards the newcomers, trademark scowl and all. It was made immediately apparent how few people he really knew in the school as other faces he didn't reckognize made their way to the party. Chris took a few more pretzels and a beer before returning to his chair. He'd join in the game was the newcomers got settled at least, the idea of socializing with strangers was a bit..well..excessive to him; But these were his teammates, it was best he should try and get along them at least.

And what if they die too.

He found himself staring towards the ocean. He took the first sip of his booze, and rather then get up and socialize, he remind in his 'bubble' that was his chair.

Emma quickly rolled awake as more people began to filter in, dropping her drink in the process. ”Shit…” she muttered, reaching down to scoop up the bottle and place it in her chair’s cup holder. She scanned the new comers, shooting a pair of finger guns at Lily and Sophia before her eyes landed on… Lawrence?

Emma shot up from her chair, bounding towards the pair Lawrence and Zoe, ”Lawrence! You’re out of the hospital… it’s been forever. I’m glad you’re alright.” Emma said with a half-smile and a tinge of guilt. She should’ve visited. Why didn’t she visit? Maybe she just thought that Lawrence didn’t want her company.

It was a little later than she'd wanted, but Kusari arrived at Emma's beach party. She had snipped her hair so that it ended just below her chin. It would grow back in a day like it always did, but for now it was fine for swimming. She had on a black and red wetsuit that ended at her forearms and her knees. She wasn't quite comfortable wearing a two-piece or one-piece. Her ribs still showed, and she didn't believe she had much to show off anyhow. At least she didn't look like half a monster anymore.

She slipped off her sandals and stepped onto the beach. She wiggled her toes into the sand, she'd nearly forgotten what it was like going to a beach. Most of her life she'd lived in the city, though she wasn't complaining. She liked the city. Some people preferred the look of the outdoors and 'getting close to nature' but she had always found the city to be beautiful in it's own way. Cities were a testament to human ingenuity and ambition. Even still, as long as she was here she figured she should enjoy herself.

She arrived just after Lawrence and Zoe, she saw Emma get up and greet them. She glanced at Lawrence, thinking about what had happened in D.C. He might have been able to calm that crowd down, at least enough to not attempt homicide. She shook her head, she wasn't going to blame him for what happened, it would be petty.

"Lawrence, I'm glad you're not dying anymore." She said, walking up to him. "Next time you're in trouble I'll try to be there." She lifted up a plastic bag she'd brought. "It's still bright out but I got sparklers, because that's a uh, a thing people do right?"

As classmates began to gather round, Zoe decided to head off the whole thing before it got out of hand. Considering Lawrence's lack of enthusiasm about this idea, it didn't seem like something he'd appreciate. Looking at the other two girls, she frowned, sounding stern if not particularly hostile. "Uh, I know Lawrence here's just out of hibernation and all, but maybe not crowding him too much would be an idea. Also," she gave Kusari a look, "no dying talk. You'll ruin the atmosphere."

Kusari shrugged her shoulders, brushing off Zoe's comment.

“Thanks, Zoe.”

He was kind of taken aback by the sudden rush, and did appreciate the moment she gave him to breathe, even if he was going to have to ultimately spit in the face of her efforts. The only reason either of them were even here right now was team bonding, and he couldn't exactly manage that while shooing everybody away at the same time. Taking his hand- which had unconsciously slipped into his shirt at the mention of his injury- he placed it on Zoe's shoulder for the second time in the past few minutes and continued;

“We're here to have fun with everyone though, remember? I can worry about my personal space after the party.”

With a squeeze that said 'I do appreciate it though' (He hoped) Lawrence let go and with the same hand pulled a lighter from the pocket of his shirt- something he'd gotten into the habit of carrying around this past week. With a quick flick he let a barely visible flame see the light of day before snuffing it out.

“Good thing I thought ahead for the fireworks though, even if it's not a thing people do it'll be a thing we're doing.”

Emma he left for last, shooting her with his free hand in a mockery of the gesture he'd caught her using a moment ago.

“Looks like you're doing all right too, this was a pretty good idea.”

”Right. Sorry,” she shot out quickly at Zoe before redirecting her attention towards Lawrence, ”I figured we could all use the distraction. I’m sure you’ve heard but… things haven’t been great.” Emma sighed, rubbing the back of her head. ”Especially after that mess in D.C.”

Another sigh.

As an afterthought Emma regarded Kusari with a nod, ”Thanks for coming, by the way. And for bringing the sparklers.”

Angel watched as one by one, more people began to joing the party. Her smile beamed when she saw Lilianna arriving with Sophia. Finally, at least someone she was friendly with showed up. Waving her hand at the two, she closed her guitar case just as Lawrence and Zoe arrived. Good, this was finally to look up great now. It was a surprise to see one of the two oldest classmates though. She hadn't seen him around recently. Ever since Wisford even.

With people she recognized and felt comfortable with, the Aberration shot up from her sitting spot on the sand and walked over the new arrivals, greeting them with a smile and a wave. "Hey guys! I'm glad you came." she then glanced at the revenant "Lawrence, nice to see you around. It's been a while, how are you?"

Sophia continued until she was almost at the large group that had formed, having returned Angélique and Emma's gestures with a nod and smile. She didn't go right ahead to join the cluster, instead stopping a good distance away, but close enough so that she could hear what was being said. There were too many people, too many. And they were all in the same place. So close together.

She felt jittery, already regretting having come here even before she had started talking to anybody. Talking. Trying not to look too awkward, Sophia assumed a more relaxed posture with her weight mostly on one leg, arms crossed loosely as she eyed the group. Lily better not make me go and talk. I can't.

“Upright, which at this point I think is pretty good.”

Angel was one of the people Lawrence had not been looking forward to talking to. Not because he particularly bliamed her for what had happened this past week (He was reserving that until he knew more), but because he knew he would eventually have to talk to her about it to see if blame was justified. Still, today wasn't going to be the day for that. He exclusively planned to relax for the duration of the party, at least as much as he could with all the attention he was garnering.

It should have been expected, but he was looking forward to the moment when he was no longer the center of attention.

“Hopefully after this get-together we're all going to be feeling a better.”

"Yeah... hopefully." Angel was self-aware of all the clouds looming over her head given the events and the unease she felt around some people here at the beach. Still, today was supposed to be a happy event, so she could at least try to push away those dark thoughts. And after all, Lawrence didn't need this pathetic sight just as he finally joined them for a group meeting.

"Well, it's good seeing you up and going. Glad to see you're well." the Aberration young woman tried to shake off her awkward tone, offering the Arbiter a somewhat forced smile. "This party is awfully quiet. I need to solve that music problem. So I guess... see you later then."

The relaxing, sunlit beach reminded Chris of back home, back with his friends before everything spiraled into hell one traumatic event at a time. Though he never had been on a beach before, just the feeling of being around them reminded him of his first friends...His first lost. He can still imagine that fort, only now it was floating over the water like a mirage. Its crudely drawn sign still fresh in its memory, the old sticks that made up the wall. Confessing that to Angelique had caused that memory to be very much present in his conscience. The other negativities such as worrying over how Siena sees him or how badly he hurt Marcus didn't help either. So lonely despite being surrounded by other students. He took another swing of his beer, in hopes that he could eventually drown out the sorrow.

Lily, noticing Emma waking up from her sleep, waved happily at her. She was, after all, her saving grace. Her tulpas made it easier for her to cope with the destructive nature of her powers. Pushing down the bad memories from resurfacing in her mind, she turned her attention to her musical friend as she approached. "Angel!" she greeted cheerily with another wave of her hand and then glanced towards Lawrence. Even though he was up and about and obviously okay, her eyes still wandered over to his torso where a gaping hole was. She almost grimaced at the memory of the pain and the blood. But being in her happy mood, the thought didn't last long. She walked over to where Brent was and tapped him gently on his back with a finger (she couldn't reach his shoulder). "Thank you for the ice cream and donuts, Brent. It was really good," she said and then gave Ernie a glance before wandering off.

Ernie looked up from his game at the voice. A frown briefly crossed his face but he covered it with a shouted, "Sunblock's by the snacks."

Lily heard Ernie's voice call out to her. Sunblock. She hasn't been out in the sun for a while so why did she need it? Maybe later. She shrugged and continued walking. Bright golden eyes fell on a lonely looking white haired boy drinking beer. She paused and blinked, trying to remember his name. When she couldn't come up with anything, she shrugged and headed towards him anyway. "Hi!" she greeted brightly.

Chris's trademark scowl met the eyes of a new face that had attempted to interact with him. "I don't believe we met." His voice seemed a bit cold, but he didn't come off as entirely rude either, aside from the hostile-like look in his eyes. "Name's Chris, I'm the dragon you may have seen fly in and out of battle." He had placed his alcohol in the sand as he continued. "And you are?"

Chris. Oh, right. Hearing the name made Lily remember that she actually wrote something about the dragon in her diary. Making a mental note to remember his name, she gave him a smile despite the unfriendly look in his eyes. "Lily. It's nice to meet you, Chris," she said, watched as he placed his beer bottle onto the sand and sank down into an indian sit beside it. She placed the violin case carefully across her legs. "You look... troubled," she commented.

He tensed up a bit. He wasn't about to let his inner demons gush out again, sparing Angelique the trouble was enough as it was. "Aren't we all?" He asked as if he was trying to diffuse the question. His eyes had returned to the crashing waves of the ocean. She was...too cheerful, a complete contrast to his nature.

The small blonde's perceptiveness kicked in and she allowed the topic to veer off into another direction. "Yeah, we all are... but today's a nice day to relax and have fun," she said, turning her eyes to the brilliant blue water. "I can't remember if I've ever been to a beach vacation before," she mused out aloud.

"Well here's your chance to enjoy it." He picked up his bottle for another sip of beer. "God knows how long this peace will last before they send us to another disaster." He offered a more grim sense of humor in his voice, something that would hopefully extinguish the uncomfortable cheerfulness he hadn't experience since...

His face had contorted into one of longing, as if he was staring at a nostalgic photograph, though his eyes faced only the salty sea.

"Hmmm hmm..." Lily looked up at the white haired boy. "Well, this is our life now. We just have to..." she paused. "...make the best out of it... well, if we can," she reached up and scratched the back of her head. "Why aren't you with the others?" she gestured towards the big group.

"Good way to put it I suppose, guess thats the only reason why I'm here, though.." He paused to allow more alchohol in his system. "Old habits I suppose...I've gotten used to being by myself."

"Oh." The blonde Aberration frowned. "Sorry if I disturbed you then. I can go if you want,"

He shook his head. "Its alright, I didn't come here to build walls...I just like to think a lot I suppose...I'll be with you and the group shortly anyway." His hands folded under his chin to rest his head over.

Lily's brow creased. Did he mean that she should go or was he allowing her to stay? She couldn't quite tell which it was and she didn't want to ask. He didn't look like he was the friendly type or someone who would appreciate her cheeriness. She stretched out her legs from under the violin, wiggled her toes and moved to stand up. Might as well just look for someone else to talk to. Maybe Emma. "Okay," was all she said.

Giving Lawrence a small nod of acknowledgement as more people began to approach, Zoe rolled her eyes. "Guess we are all here to have fun, aren't we?" Still, she didn't feel like discussing recoveries - or, for that matter, anything about what had happened since Wisford. "In that case, I think I'll leave you to your fan club. Nice to see you guys, though."

The redhead didn't feel any obligation to hang around while everyone caught up with Lawrence, so she walked away from the group with a friendly grin. For now, she grabbed a (thankfully non-alcoholic) drink, looking around the beach before calling out to the guys by the net. Despite a slight wince at the sight of Ernie, she figured there was no point trying to avoid everyone. "You guys need players, I'm in. Better than sitting around staring at the ocean, right?"

At the sight of Zoe, Ernie had to force back a loud snicker. He instead gave her small wave and grin as she approached, losing himself yet another point with the distraction. Urgh, the score gap was getting larger with every passing minute. "Afternoon Zoe. Which team you feel like joining?"

Returning his wave, Zoe paused to think for a moment. "Dunno." Although from what little she'd seen of the game... she returned his grin with a smile of her own. "You kinda look like you could use the help."

The boy's shoulders visibly drooped. "That bad? Really?"

"Hey, I've seen worse." Zoe would be lying if she said he was great, but... if he sucked that badly she probably would have joined the other side. At least, if the game mattered at all. "But it doesn't look like you're winning from where I'm standing."

"You got it." Nodding, Zoe took her place on Ernie's side of the court for the game to continue. Honestly, she wasn't far above average when it came to skill, but pure physical ability - and a competitive streak a mile wide - left her more than able to hold her own.

Maybe showing up wasn't such a terrible idea. Siena had made a late entrance to the beach party, having spent far too long debating on whether she actually wanted to go--that argument with herself didn't last nearly as long as the debate on whether she actually did want to wear a swimsuit. The one she'd purchased in DC was all but ruined between the spa treatment and the following events--don't think about that--but the one that she'd brought with her had been neatly shoved into the pile of other clothing brought from the school.

In the end, she'd compromised, putting the one piece on beneath a beach wrap, the deep navy fabric printed with a simple, floral pattern along the edges. It was about as effective as a summer dress, and she wasn't entirely breaking that hypothetical dress code either.

That aside, everyone else seemed preoccupied with whatever it was that happened at beach parties, and for each person that joined the crowd, Siena found herself more reluctant to try and join the festivities, finding comfort in settling somewhere with enough sun to be warm, but not overbearing, her phone tucked away into a small purse, waterproof e-reader carefully set in one hand.

...somehow, it all felt a little less chaotic than the last "party" that her peers had held.

"Yo, 'ena," Brent called from the distance, taking a break from getting spitroasted now that Ernie actually had someone who could receive the jump serves that he dropped. "Come on and join us!"

He needed back up now after all. One didn't win volleyball matches just by continuously giving the other side chances, after all.

Attention torn from her endeavors, Siena glanced up at the distant voice, e-reader lowering to give her a clearer line of vision, but not clearing up more than that--most notably, it didn't do wonders for clearing up what she couldn't quite hear. It's ungainly to shout across a distance. Ugh. Right. Setting the reader into her bag before standing to dust the sand out of the folds of her wrap, the girl made her approach, only stopping to speak when she was close enough to avoid having to raise her voice.

'Not the way that Maya explained it.' Was the first thought that came to mind. Maya's explanation had been, largely, "well it doesn't matter that much on the rules if everyone intends on playing only half clothed". Not exactly what she assumed was appropriate for the current situation.

"Um...sort of?" Hit the ball over the net and don't let it touch the ground came to mind--generally a pretty good rule to follow when it came down to sports involving nets. Adding that to some arbitrary rules from an embarrassingly badly written suggestion from one of her blog's readers, and Siena was sure that she could at least figure out what she was doing wrong. "I can probably figure it out...?"

"Hey, don't worry about it!" Ernie called out cheerfully, glad that Zoe's appearance had stalled his single-handed wrecking at the hands of Brent, "I don't remember half the rules either! Have you sunblocked up?"

Well, that was a relief. At least she wouldn't be the only one trying to fumble through the game. Admittedly, it made the brunette more than aware that it was likely to be a showdown between Brent and Zoe in that case. No harm done. Giving a nod of affirmation to Ernie's inquiry, Siena lightly pat her shoulder. "Yep. Can't tan if I burn like a lobster."

Ernie nodded with approval.

"Looks like someone's finally had the same mindset as yours, eh, Ernie?"

"Yeah, it's beautiful."

"So..." A sideways glance towards his new teammate. "That blanket's part of your battle uniform or something, 'ena?"

"Oh, um--" Siena had to pause. It wouldn't have been convenient to wear the wrap while trying to do anything active. 'Right."

Freeing her arms of the makeshift straps of the wrap, the brunette peeled it away from her body before tossing the printed fabric into a pile off to the side, but immediately regretting the decision. Aside from the fact that she was very suddenly only in her swimsuit, there was going to be sand in every fold. A faint grimace, but she brushed the expression away and tried to think of things other than she did not have this. "There we go."

Zoe grinned at Siena's arrival, looking around the court enthusiastically. "Finally calling in backup, Brent? Great. Go ahead and jump on in, Siena." A challenging smirk was shot towards the opposing pair as Zoe glanced towards Ernie. "Kicking two asses is better than one, after all."

Hey, it was a competition, right? Zoe figured this stuff was always more fun when people got fired up, but her taunting was meant in good spirit for once. "Best of three?"

Ernie's grimace at the callously thrown beach wrap was interrupted by Zoe's proclamation. Oh no. This was a serious game now?

He nodded rapidly, hoping things wouldn't go too badly against his favour. Best way to avoid that was to avoid pissing off Zoe. "Ass-kicking's definitely something to enjoy in large amounts."

It didn't take someone sensitive to emotion to feel the blaze of competition, and though Siena still kept her expression steady, the brunette was fairly certain that she'd just made a terrible decision in agreeing to join in. Ass-kicking? Was this particular match more serious than she had come in expecting? The word "mistake" blared like a screeching alarm as Siena sent a sidelong glance toward her teammate.

"Remind me next time you call me over that I should be prepared for this ass-kicking thing."

"Hey now," Brent laughed, "I thought this was just a friendly match, Siena. Dunno why Zoe's escalating it, but it's not fun if you don't put in some effort, eh?"

And then, that smile faded. Turned serious. Focused. Taking a few steps back on the sandy turf, Brent gripped the volleyball in one hand and breathed. For all his assurances of the not-serious atmosphere of the match, he wasn't going to give up victories just to make others feel good about themselves.

Hey, Harker, let's kick their ass.

Words unspoken sounded in his mind as the arbiter tossed the ball up, took a running start, leaped into the air, and started the real competition.

Seeing everyone started to enjoy themselves one way or the other in this party, Angel felt like she should either be mingling with the few people who actually still wanted to talk to her, or do as she told Lawrence and see to compensate for the broken walkman Brent thought had been a good idea to use as a radio. Looking over that the few people she still was friends with, they were either busy on their own or playing with the ones she wasn't quite fond of.

Grabbing another beer from the cooler as well as a bag of chips, Angélique returned to the spot she had left her guitar earlier. Looked like right now was the best moment to make the atmosphere a bit livelier. Seeing Lilianna seemed to have finished talking to Christopher, the raven-haired Aberration waved her blonde peer as a gesture to join her, accompanied by a magical whisper reaching out to Lily's ears "Lily! How about we start putting some music into this party?"

Lily stood up from where she was standing, brushing the sand off of herself and making sure that the violin was safe. She turned her head towards Emma's direction but before she could take a step towards her, Angel's voice sounded in her ears. The blonde girl stopped and blinked in amazement before she nodded and redirected her route towards her musician friend.

As soon as she was beside her dark haired friend, she grinned. "Something upbeat?" she asked.

"You got it girl! Something to shake things up for a party." Angel grinned in return to her blonde friend, whipping out the guitar from its case and swinging the strap over her shoulder. They needed something with a good rhythm for a beach party. Something upbeat, as Lily suggested. Something that would cast off a bit of the unease everyone had been feeling over the weeks.

Strumming the strings of her guitar, punctuated by frequent rattling of her thumb on the guitar's surface as to add another beat to the chord's sound, Angélique provided a smooth and joyful music fitting for the beach's atmosphere by reproducing a tempo akin to spanish folk music.

The melody that Angel had started playing wasn't one she was familiar with (or at least she can't remember if she was familiar with it) but a grin spread across her lips anyway. Her mind, while fragmented, automatically analyzed the tempo and the tune as she settled down onto the sand in an indian sit. As soon as she was seated, her hands busied themselves in taking out the violin carefully from its case. I should ask for my own violin when we get back to USARILN, she thought to herself as she placed the violin against her chin. "I hope they all like our music, she commented as her bow made contact with the strings and she began playing along, adding the distinct sound of the violin to angel's guitar, smoothly following her tune.

Angel smiled as Lilianna joined her, the music of a violin was not a usual sound in Spanish songs, but Lily managed well to keep up with the guitar and actually make it sound just right with the tempo. "I'm sure they will. And even if they don't, I don't care. At least we are having fun, right?" Angélique replied lightly as she kept her gig going jolly.

Lily giggled in agreement as she continued playing, showing off her versatility with her chosen musical instrument. "Music is fun. I should have done this earlier... makes me remember a lot of stuff too," she said happily.

I'm glad you like it. I've always wanted to play with someone else. Angel added gleefully. Of course, she always did appreciate either playing music for Allison and hearing her play, but there was another guitar missing when they spent time together in the evening. It was fun to play both in harmony. Just like back in Washington when everyone gathered in the music room and played together. Now that was truly a wonderful moment.

Maybe we could play together more often? I mean, if you have a lot of free time, both here and at the institute, why not hone our skills and have fun at the same time by having more frequent sessions? That'd be something nice to do.

The invitation bought an instant happy glimmer in Lily's eyes. "I'd really like that... Thank you," she said. "I could even try playing other instruments... I think I do fairly well with the flute. Maybe the piano too... and..." she looked at the guitar in Angel's eyes. "I think I might even remember the music the Sebastian used to play on the guitar," she giggled happily as the music she was playing picked up.

You'll have to show me! It's quite amazing that you know how to play a lot of instruments. I only know how to play different styles of guitar, a bit of piano and sing. I'd very much like to hear what your brother used to play." The raven-haired musician was quite enthusiastic, curious even, at the secret musical skills her friend might have. She was talented for sure, that much they discovered. The more they kept going, the more Angel wanted to learn about Lily, and help her uncover her past. And for some strange reason, there was something familiar about hearing the name of Lilianna's brother and which instrument he played. A guitarist named Sebastian...

Lily occasionally waved her bow as though it was a magic wand as she made pauses in the melody she was creating. "He was really good and we all said that he'd be famous one day. Although unlike me, he only wanted to play the guitar. He said I could play the rest if I wanted to," she chuckled as the memories seemed to flow into her unhampered.

Angel's melody grew smoother and calmer, invoking a relaxing beach song as she listened to the blonde Aberration's memories. Angélique was always quite interested to hear the girl's few moments of insight, trying to become the listening ear to her forgotten past as Lilianna seemed to forget about those just as quickly as she remembered them. As such, her rhythm has slowed to allow her to clearly ear her friend's stories.

"Your brother reminds me of one guy I used to play with for some time before, also named Sebastian. Not quite as famous as I was, but he sure was one of the guys I had the most fun playing with. I believe it was during my stay in Maine, if I recall correctly."

"Really? That would be so cool if you guys know each other. Seb used to play with his friends and some gigs that I can't really remember. I should ask him about that. But anyway, we're from..." Lily paused, her brow furrowing and her lips pulling down into a frown. "From..." she tried again, trying to wrack her brain for a hometown. She stopped playing, her bow poised and frozen just above the violin's strings. "I... can't remember... where I'm from..." she admitted slowly, a look of annoyance on her face.

Angélique looked at Lilianna with quite a lot of anticipation, seeing as the girl was in a mood to remember. However, the shortcoming was greatly disappointing. It was sad, really, but if her loss was rooted that far, then it'd take a bit more time for her to remember fully her origins.

Seb though? A nickname she clearly had been using to call the musician she was acquainted with. It would just be oh so very strange to have an unexpected tie with Lily's past. "Take it easy, Lily. It'll come back to you, slowly but surely. You do so much progress every time we see each other." Angélique reassured the small blonde Aberration with a comforting smile, the music of her guitar almost brought to a halt too. "Maybe ask your brother about it next time? He should be the one able to help you the most actually, given you two seemed to be so close."

Lily nodded. "Yeah, I'll definitely ask him...maybe later," she said as she began playing a staccato.

Sander and Christmas showed up a little bit after that. Interestingly, Christmas came wearing a two piece blue swimsuit, complete with a tube top and frilly mini skirt bottom, while Sander just wore a simple pair of beach shorts. The blood mage took a few minutes to observe the festivities, but he did not participate. Instead, he kept to himself, taking a seat at the edge of the water and watching the waves. Christmas kept close to him, as expected, sitting nearby and fiddling with the frill of his skirt. The healer eyed the ongoing fun, but was content to sit beside Sander, holding the taller boy's hand in his lap and simply watching everyone else, happy enough to have been brought along like he belonged there.

Emma had returned to her perch, sitting with bottle in hand lazily staring off into the horizon. She perked up a little at the sight of more new arrivals, recognizing Sander but not the person beside him. She stood up, waving to the pair and beginning to walk over. She slowed a bit as she approached, eyeing Sander’s companion. Is that… a man in a two piece?

Emma did her best to ignore the oddness of his outfit, trying to recall who he was, ”Hey guys! Glad you could make it. Good to see ya Sander, and you must be…” he was the healer, wasn’t he? ”Christmas, right? I don’t think we’ve met. I’m Emma, or Em. Either way is fine.” she said, extending her hand to the… boy?

Christmas stared at the hand like he expected it to withdraw suddenly. When it didn't, he reached for the gesture tentatively, nodding at Emma and forgetting entirely to return her greeting, fretting as he was at sudden socialization.

"Emma." -Sander nodded in greetings, offering her a smile.

Emma glanced between the two. It didn’t seem like they were too interested in talking to her, and the hand in Christmas’s lap was enough of a hint that she should probably just leave the two alone. She gave the two a slightly suggestive raise of the eyebrow, ”Well, have fun you guys. I’ll leave you two to it.” She said, starting to back away.

"N-Nice to meet you," the healer replied, though he failed to raise his voice enough.

"See ya." Sander was quick to turn away, preoccupied with the smell of surf and sand and the person beside him.

"Quick! Peel out! Awesome drift stop!"

"I'm sorry sir, but I'm not allowed to do things like that. It's too dangerous, and far too risky for the vehicle."

"Can we blare the radio the whole way in? I've got an entrance to remake."

"No."

"Can you at least lay on the horn?"

"No."

Marcus remained quiet for the few minutes it took for the unmarked pickup truck to pull to a stop just off of the subnatural beach party that was currently happening. He quickly hopped out nearly catching his T-Shirt on the handle as he did so, slightly irritated with the butler's lack of enthusiam and complete unwillingness to play along with his schemes. From there, he walked around to the back of the truck and pulled down the gate, a large piece of firewood shifting with the decently sized surfboard that was in the back, nearly falling out and onto his foot. The stereo in the back was fortunately safe from all the smashing around the wood had done, and he was silently grateful that there didn't appear to be any damage to the board.

"Alright people! I brought firewood! Not unloading it all by myself though, so come help if you want a decent campfire!" Marcus shouted to the others, unloading the board and resting it near the tables first.

Speak of the devil, with his rest thoroughly disturbed from the noise, the sleepy eyed arbiter arrived at the scene of the beach party unsurprisingly late. Clad in a simple t-shirt and swimming trunks, he gazed at all the partygoers that were there at the time. The moment he noticed the amount of people that were there, the deep feeling of intimidation settled in. Perhaps going was not such a good idea, but the exclamation of the boy... Marcus caught his attention.

"I will help," he said, making his way over and summoning his chains, connecting them to the logs of wood to lift them out of the pickup truck.

"Thanks, Grant. I'm glad SOMEBODY is willing to help me!" Marcus said, making it a point to shout the final part across the beach to everyone else who was distinctly not lending a hand. Hell, even the butler in the car was fiddling with the radio instead of helping them out. What did a guy have to do to get some service around here?

"Just throw them anywhere, we'll figure out where the campfire is actually going later."

"Ah, it's all good," Ernie called out from the snack station, "You two could use the workout! And Grant, sunblock's by the snacks over there."

Having spent an inordinate amount of time shaking sound off her wrap and still finding it grating against her skin, Siena opted to shove it into her bag, carefully settling her e-reader over it before making any move to help with...firewood. Ignoring the knowledge that her body wouldn't appreciate it the next morning, the Arbiter made her way to the truck.

She really should have brought her phone.

"Did we need this much wood?" An honest question, considering Siena didn't entirely understand why a campfire was necessary on the beach to begin with.

"Hey, I have the body of a greek god." Marcus shouted back indignantly, trying to prove his point by lifting one of the larger logs out of the truck. There was a sickening 'crunch' as the thing landed on his foot, followed by high-pitched shout, a loud swear, and static. Marcus instead rolled the log across the sand, failing to not seem embarassed.

Just...before the god-ness. Like...god baby." He muttered quietly to himself.

"I don't think there's such as a thing as 'too much wood' when a party like this is involved." Marcus said, slowly struggling past Siena.

"I think your foot begs to differ." Which was an understatement given the extent of what she'd just witnessed. Each passing thought brought Siena another sliver of regret. She really should have brought her phone or the reader over, but somehow it had seemed "unnecessary" for lifting logs. "There are plenty of other people that will help!" And plenty of people to drop logs to break their feet, apparently. Letting her roommate complete his treacherous journey to spare at least part of his dignity, the girl moved to slide a reasonably sized log from its place before calling to the duo helping with the wood. "I'll put it wherever you end up!"

After a hearty cackle at Marcus' misfortune, Ernie got to his feet too.

"Plenty of Greeks in this class already," he hefted a log about the size of the one Marcus was rolling along. The buzzcut boy was faring better but was still obviously struggling with it.

"Hey. My foot's fine. And there is no way for you to prove otherwise." Marcus said, rolling his log to a stop and taking a rest by leaning on it. He wiggled his toes as if to prove his point, brushing some of the hair and beginning trickles of sweat out of his eyes.

He took a moment, seemingly counting off numbers in his head before his body seemed to flicker slightly; evidence that he'd rewound to the exact same position he'd started at. He was trying to get better about remembering to send his abilities into their 'cooldown' mode, simply because he didn't want to get caught with only one use of them in the thick of things.

Just another thing to try and get used to.

Following after Marcus, Siena set her log down, catching sight of the flicker. Hm, clever...she'd have to remember that he was fully capable of pulling back to a state before injury. Setting the thought to the back of her head for future analysis, Siena simply raised an eyebrow at the display.

"Nothing to prove otherwise? You mean I completely imagined that squeaky sound?"

"Clearly a godly war cry," Ernie chimed.

The firewood stacked on the beach was Chris's cue to break out of his brooded corner and offer his assistance. With Siena present as well, the unwanted despair he felt only grew inside him, yet he kept that concealed with a standoffish persona as he had done before. With his hands in his pockets, Chris approached the group once more. "Oh, hi Siena." He said in a casual tone as if nothing was wrong. "Guess its my turn to chip in."

"Completely imagined. Must be a mouse in the logs, or one of the truck joints settling." Marcus said, still leaning on his log. "Certainly was not me. That'd be ridiculous."

He didn't move as Chris wandered up, instead choosing to cross his arms in irritation. "Be nice if you were helpful for once, yeah." he said, just loud enough that Chris should have been able to hear it. He mentally cursed himself for not looking around to make sure Angel was out of earshot, quickly giving a check to see if he was about to get scolded.

Chris heard the remark, and said nothing. Marcus was in his right after all, when had he ever had been helpful? He was more of a hazard then a hero. He wanted to scoff at the idea that they needed him, reminded of Angel's words of encouragement she said on that night of billiards. Chris grabbed a nearby shovel and began to toss sand neatly into a pile until he made a hole deep and wide enough to accomadate a campfire. Once the pit was complete he took the few logs already unloaded from the truck and stacked them in the pit, trying to angle them so that there was room for air beneath the individual logs.

Putting the shovel back where he found it, Chris returned to face the pit and inhaled deeply. In another moment, he released his breathe as a line of fire that doused the bottom of the hole, careful not to instantly incinerate the wood. The flames were potent enough to catch the logs without the need of kindling. "There...Did anyone bring marshmallows?"

"Yo!" Brent called out to the bonfire kiddos, a stack of logs cradled in his arms, "Why didja start so early with the burning?"

Indeed, as he approached, it was clear that whoever started the bonfire (probably Chris), didn't have any idea how to build one to begin with. Perhaps it's because he thought his power was enough. Perhaps it's because he was never a Boy Scout. Perhaps it's because he just wanted to show off early. Regardless, the arbiter rolled his eyes at the pitiful flames and dropped his armload of logs onto the sand.

"Bit premature, really," he said, "And yeah, someone's definitely brought marshmallows. Don't know about chocolate and graham crackers, but there's also meat in the cooler." As he spoke, he began to set the new logs up, one at a time, creating a tepee of sorts.

At the least, there was plenty of company to distract from the fact that seeing (and speaking to, she supposed) Chris for the first time in over a week was awkward. Plenty of people to push the thought of trampling emotions and telling herself that she hadn't made a mistake away. Plying herself with the most efficient mask that she could create at a moment's notice, the brunette glanced between the growing members of the group.

"I didn't know you could do that without transforming, Chris." Nodding at the fire in question, Siena glanced up at the boy. "That's pretty convenient."

"Yeah...took a lot of us by surprise, I think." Marcus said, moving back to the group after putting a fair distance between him and the impromptu lighter. In the quickly dimming light, Marcus simply shot Chris a look, waiting to see if the boy would do anything. Waiting to see if Chris would be willing to show his true colors in front of all these people.

There it was; guilt, despair, loneliness. Chris could feel the resentment in Marcus's choice of words and he felt every inch of shame he felt he deserved. There was hesitation for him to continue,. his eyes merely met the flames with the thought of jumping into it as if the flames could burn away his sorrow. A dark thought that, fortunately, never came to be anything else; He denied himself the easy way out before. To him, to allow himself to take his own life was to let the universe that had given such misfortune win. His sense of spite, or rather whatever shreds of pride he had, could never accept such a fate.

The arbiter stood up to reply to Siena. "Well I suppose in some cases." He didn't want to say anything more then that, though he could have said how much it made him feel like a monster, how he despised this hellish curse, or confess all of his inner turmoils; he didn't want to. Rather, he didn't want their pity. He didn't need it, it was bad enough Angelique knew. Would Marcus forgive him if he knew? No, he had every right to hate him. There was no amount of tragedy that could remedy his sin,

'Whoa.' The thought was an understatement if Siena considered what her observation had brought about. Palpable tension aside, the brunette had to rewind her thoughts, listen again to the words that had been spoken only an instant before. Evidently Marcus had known about the ability, but that knowledge had given way to a familiar reaction. Her conversation with Chris at the same beach came to mind. It wasn't as severe then--or maybe it was simply her own memory trying to paint it with a gentler feel so that damnable instinctive need to stop hurting people would be put at ease--but the similarities were there. A brief flash of concern as stormy eyes flicked from one party to another.

"Um..." A few questions came to mind. Did something happen? Were the two okay? Should she have been concerned about the situation? But none of them formed in words that felt proper to say at that moment. Cautiously, she settled her gaze on Marcus. "Took a lot of us by surprise?"

"Were you expecting him to light a campfire using magic dragon breath?" Marcus said, tactfully avoiding the implied question that he was very aware of. It was clear from his tone that he was withholding information, even so far as to be coy about it.

Her gaze settled, habit making it take on the same expression she'd worn the last time she'd had any real conversation with the temporal mage. Eyes hardened faintly, lips settling into a shadow of a frown for less than a fraction of a second before Siena noticed, repaired the mask, replaced it with the expected level of concern. "Marcus..." Her tone should have said it all. What exactly are you saying?

Seeing the campfire being made, Angélique couldn't help but stop playing for a moment. Bonfires evoked some fond memories from her past. Sitting around a blazing fire while drinking with friends and playing music, those were good summer times. "Lily, let's take a break! I want to sit and watch the fire."

Putting her guitar back in its case, Angélique walked slowly back to the gathering of classmates around the campfire, bringing her bottle of beer along as she stopped next to Christopher. "Hey, sweet campfire! Wouldn't be a party without those, right? Someone brought hot-dogs sausages to roast?"

Lily nodded and continued playing for a bit before she herself put the violin back in its case and following after her singer friend.

"Well... Marcus said, eyes darting from Siena, to Chris, to the rapidly approaching Angel. "It's not exactly my story to tell." Again, another implication; words hidden behind seemingly straight-faced sentances. With any luck, Angel didn't know what he was talking about, and Siena wouldn't ask him any more questions.

Of course, he couldn't be blamed if other people started getting interrogated, could he?

"Campfire story time?" Ernie brightened at the prospect, blatantly ignoring the singer's arrival.

"Yup," Brent replied, saluting Angelic, "Working on that right now."

While others generated more aggressive tension than two totally straight dudes did in the locker room, he had been working at skewering all sorts of meat, from plain ol processed sausages to marinated kebabs to strips of bacon to corn. Wrapped in aluminum foil and placed next to the fire were potatoes and yams as well, while a bit farther off, there was a bag of fluffy marshmallows that the carnivorous boy neglected entirely.

"And hey, we doing ghost stories? Love stories? Real stories?"

"Well, what's the usual deal for beach parties?" Ernie moved to help Brent with the skewers, grabbing a few to hold over the fire.

"Usually, either drunk stories or deep discussions, depends on the mood really."

The balded Aberration felt a tinge of irritation that it was Angelique he had to respond to. Ah well, he'd been enough of a dick today. All he needed to do was keep the nasty stuff inside, right? "Hm. I don't know about you guys but I've got plenty of drunk stories to tell. Should we wait until after all the meat is done?"

"Go ahead. That will make something good to listen to while the food is cooking."

Lily silently sat down near the fire, her eyes shifting from Angel to Ernie as they conversed. I suppose even people who hates each other can still be civil with each other, she thought to herself, her eyes on Ernie for a seconds before shifting it to the fire. She wondered for a brief second if the boy hated her as much as he did Angel before she pushed the thought aside. She reached into her pocket, took out her phone and held it up to take a picture. She snapped a photo of the fire and then sent it to her brother with the caption 'Bonfire now, did we do this before?'

With more arriving to the fire and the conversation taking a different direction, Chris took a quick trip to take a few more logs from the truck and leave them closer to the group to add to the fire when needed, and then returned to his chair some distance away from the group and closer to the water. At the very least, he could catch the last glimmer of sunlight as it faded into darkness over the ocean.

"Alright, but these are the kind of stories that shouldn't be told in front of a sober audience," Ernie rotated the skewers over the edge of the fire, unfortunately catching Chris scurrying to the water, "I wanna hear Marcus and Chris' fire story first! You guys didn't try fire juggling did you?"

"Ah, but what's the fun of hearing them drunk if we won't remember them the day after?" Angel drank the rest of her beer, getting up to get another bottle but keeping her ears on the campire crew. For some reason, she doubted a fire-related story involving Marcus and Chris would end well.

"Some tales were meant to be lost to the ages," the buzzcut boy replied sagely, "I'm sure that some people in these stories would actually prefer it if it was forgotten. Plus, if you guys can't remember it the next morning then that just means I can tell them again! Recycling, y'know? C'mon, what was the fire for? Extreme pancake making? Flaming circus hoops?"

"Eh, Marcus and Chris did a thing?" Brent tilted his head slightly, wondering why Ernie was pushing so hard. Did they really need an answer now? "Anyways, who wants the venison? Only got four skewers of it now, so they're pretttty low supply."

Not far away a soft moan could be heard. Slowly, Emma got up from her seat and glanced around. It was night. How long had she slept? It wasn’t hard to spot the gathering around the campfire, and she wasted no time approaching. She was more than a little tantalized by Brent’s talk of venison, the rumble in her stomach evident. ”Yeah, let me at that.” Emma said, tactlessly sneaking up to the fire and grabbing a skewer. ”What’re we doin’? Stories?” Emma said, already moving to take a bite but restraining herself due to the heat.

"I think you're right Ernie; there are definitely people out there who would prefer these stories be forgotten." Marcus said quietly, moving on with his train of response, hopefully before anybody could think about that statement for too long.

"What do you think, Chris? Got an interesting story to tell the people?" Marcus said, shouting off in Chris's direction. Angel be damned, he was still trying. Perhaps this would be interesting, or perhaps he'd have to make something up to appease Ernie. After all, he wasn't trying to get the kid mobbed.

He just wouldn't stop it if it happened.

"I'll have a taste of that!" Angel walked towards the campfire, feeling its heat brushing over her exposed skin. She quickly retreated back to Lily after grabbing one of the skewers, but as she passed close to Marcus, she gave the boy that look that would say it all. No words this time, only a slight frown.

Chris had become frozen once Ernie prodded him on with the story. He hadn't even make it halfway to his chair when he made the request. It's not as if he wanted to keep secrets, but now was not really the best time for a confession.

No, they deserved to know. They needed to know. It was only just that they should despise a monster such as him. "It's not much of a story, really." He said as he made his way to the cooler for another bottle of booze. He could not express his sorrows sober.

He downed that beer as fast he could, the whole bottle. Two bottles were certainly not enough to get him wasted, and part of him cursed that he had tried to make this easier for himself. After the suspense of chugging down a bottle he continued "If you must know, I went out of my way to get into a fight with Marcus like the bastard I am. If that wasn't damning enough, in that fight I also burned his leg with my breath." He expressed more of a standoffish tone in his voice rather then guilt. He already apologized for his crimes and he wasn't expecting any sort of sympathy or forgiveness. Finishing that confession, he made his way back to his chair, but not before taking a few more bottles with him.

With the confession, Ernie froze. Fury rose in him just like it had that morning with Angel. Exactly like that morning. Which was exactly why he needed to shove it down before he did something really stupid.

He tossed a meaningful glance in Brent's direction before moving straight to Marcus. If his Reno days had taught him anything, it was that the polite thing to do was to inform a friend before you break someone's goddamn fingers in their honour.

"Marcus," the Aberration did his best to keep his face and tone neutral, speaking closely so that only the Arbiter would hear, "How come we haven't beaten the living shit out of this guy yet?"

"That's a pretty shitty story." Marcus said, sitting back with his arms crossed. He honestly hadn't expected Chris to openly admit what he had done; the confession kind of ruined any attempt to try and drag this out as long as possible. "And burned is putting it lightly." he muttered softly, taking a bite of one of the skewers he'd grabbed.

His eyes flicked to Ernie as the boy spoke. There was a slight sense of pride, knowing that Ernie at least had his back even in the littlest things. "Oh, I already did that. Almost immediately." Marcus said, although he couldn't keep a sly smile from spreading across his face.

The realisation came to him gradually but once it hit, Ernie felt a manic grin appear on his face to match Marcus'. He was still furious, of course, but if his scarred friend had everything under control...

He chuckled vacantly and began moving back to his cooking. "Just say the word and I'll get things done. Guy doesn't mess with one of us without getting the others too."

The bite she took from the venison left a bitter taste in Angélique's mouth as she heard Christopher revealing what he did to Marcus in front of everyone. What the fuck was he thinking? Social suicide? There were other ways to deal with that situation, and right now really had not been the best of opportunities. A frown clearly was etched in the Aberration's face as she scanned Chris secluding himself once more after making that bold statement, then Marcus.

"Way to fuck up the mood, guys. Real smooth..." she said, obviously displeased by both involved parties.

Lily remained quiet, content in listening to the people around her speak and letting her eyes wander from speaker to speaker. But unlike most, she marveled at how Chris could openly admit what he had done in front of everyone, including the one he had wronged. Aside from the fact that he probably had one of the coolest powers among them.

Emma took a bite of the venison. A slow, awkward bite. What the fuck did she just walk into? The scene unsettlingly reminded of her of the usual high school drama she thought she was done with, but with a dash of superpowers and mutilation. Emma slowly moved, creeping up on Marcus and placing a gentle hand on his back but not saying anything.

"Story." Some story that was. Siena had watched, carefully, for the shifts of expression that might tell her more than simple words. As Chris made his quick retreat, Siena was left trying to turn over the events in her head. Picking a fight, burning someone else's flesh--what if it hadn't been Marcus? But even then, it was hard to believe that the Arbiter would have resorted to such extreme tactics on a whim. Should have been hard to believe that, her mind corrected.

'Are you forgetting?' Memories of their mental link, thoughts of the familiar, primal emotion that had almost covered up the one she'd tried to cut away...was that there even when he wasn't sporting a collosal form? The two sides that refused to meet waged war again. The instinctive, fiery side that wanted to be angry and the cold, rational one that told her that being angry had no use--neither were doing a good job of winning.

"Um...sorry..." Siena rose to her feet, dusted herself of sand, and exerted as much control as she could over the war in her head. "I'll be right back."

Marcus said nothing more, as Angel's scolding hit some sort of sore spot with him. He wasn't really interested in making the beach party hell for anybody but Chris, but the impromptu confession had ruined that angle too. He gave a small nod to Ernie, sidling a step closer to Emma as she placed a hand on his back, almost unconsciously moving for the familiar.

"So..." Marcus said, attempting to break the silence. "How was the volleyball game?"

Well. Ok. He could consider these developments for a different time. Watching the drama unfold and then suddenly deflate with Chris leaving the party and Siena going after the draconic arbiter, Brent took a bite of a kebab. Would this help? Or would this devolve into a melee? Things to consider, but...no, if Chris was going to wallow in self-loathing, he wasn't going to lash out on the person he had feelings for, right?

Wrong.

"Volleyball was a blast," Brent said, smiling, shifting the topic forcibly, playing the same game he had with Ernie back in DC, "Didn't realize it was standard technique to receive spikes with your face though, Ernie. You sure that nose is alright?"

"Got my rope up just in time! It's all good here."

Angel's eyes turned to where Siena was going. This situation sure wouldn't help the relationship between the two of them, but it was probably for the best to leave them alone to talk about this. As much as she'd like to scold Marcus about what he'd done, or Christopher to have plainly decided to reveal what happened, the time wasn't appropriate for that. Instead, Angel just finished her beer in one go, before returning to the cooler and grabbing an alcoholized bottle of juice.

I swear, we're cursed... Angel sighed, her gaze returning to the campfire.

After making a hasty exit, Siena thought about getting her bag. About having some form of security in case she was wrong--in case she was right--about things. She considered it even as she approached Chris, thought about retreating and having a source in hand. Would it have helped?

"Hey."

Chris wasn't expecting company, nor did he want any. Was she taking pity on him? Monsters didn't need sympathy. Before he responded he made sure to uncap his bottle and take a swig. "Hey." As much as he wanted to avoid pushing her away, out of fear of hurting her too, his drained expression was too weak to turn her away. Maybe it wasn't pity, maybe she was just here for the opposite, proclaiming how much of a monster he is. He waited for her to continue, and offered her an unopened beer in his silence.

'And how exactly were you planning on approaching this?'

Head on.

'Great plan, self.'

"Oh, it's okay. I don't really drink beer." Turning down the drink with a gentle motion of the hand, Siena considered her next course of action. It was easy to see that after the entire debacle, Chris was far from peak mental condition--isn't that better for this?. Her mind worked through the motions. Sit down to stay on the same level--not a demand--but don't let up. She did exactly that.

"You didn't tell them everything, did you?" A clear, calm question without any real intonation--as though she was merely stating a fact instead of digging for answer.

"What more should I say? That I'm a monster that almost killed a classmate over something stupid? That I went out of my way to punch a kid in the mouth because he called me names? There is no reason to say anything more, what I did was inexcusable." He snapped but more so at himself then Siena, she just had the displeasure of being the only one to yell at. His guilt over Marcus was just the tip of the iceberg that was his despair, that confession was little compared to what he kept to himself; Angelique having been the only person to know some of the deeper burdens he carried, and he would be damned to let this be another session. He didn't want them to know, no one should know, telling Angelique was a mistake he wasn't going to repeat.

now he was paranoid. What if she told them already? What if they knew and already felt fake sorrow for him? That this was all some kind of farce that Marcus thankfully didn't excuse his crime because of it. Another long gulp of booze poured down his body to suite his anguish.

The words glanced off her like poorly made arrows on a steel plate--a little irritation had never been able to do much to the girl. She kept her placid air, ignored the sharpness of Chris's self-condemnation, and watched for a moment before she spoke again.

"And that's not everything." A statement more than a question at that point, and easier to see now that the girl wasn't being suffocated by tension from every angle. 'You're easy to read.' She quieted those words before they escaped her, opting for another route. "Remember the last time we trained? When we tried to see if a link could help with communication?"

She didn't feel the need to keep pushing the words. Let him finish the idea on his own.

"....You felt that, right?That...urge..no..instinct; wrath, anger." There was a pause. Hesitation, caution, fear. Inner turmoils and past tragedies were difficult enough to bottle up, but his fears he could not. "Its not as simple as a stigma, its....Its as if its alive...my very power....Us rather then me...I.....I don't just take the mask of a monster, Siena, no its like I already am one, or we share souls or..something." The thought was clearly frustrating him. He had only barely expressed this fear twice, once with Angelique and the other earlier today, both of which was only a glimpse in the root of it, but knowing Siena could feel it Chris no longer felt alone in hiding it. "Its gotten better after that session, at least I think it has, but...Even after that I still get...it gets angry...like it expects me to carry its pride and anger." He wasn't even sure if that was the case, it never spoke to him, the urges could just be that and nothing more, but his fear and suspicions had convinced him otherwise. "They see me as one of them Siena...They think I'm supposed to be with them, until I attack them of course but..." He clutched the half-empty bottle tight in his hand before taking another long swig as he descended into madness. "It said Why...It said why..Why did it say why? Why did it sound like that. Why." He said in a somewhat panicked tone, eyes strained to the ocean as if delirious, a fear that gnawed at was once a standoffish persona. He had felt like he already knew that answer, but had been too scared to admit it.

It had been like opening a floodgate--too direct. You've drowned him--and the torrent that it unleashed might have been overwhelming if she hadn't been prepared. Siena listened, as always, observed what she could as something in her tried to burn away the excess thoughts. Didn't this seem familiar? It was, wasn't, too many things in between again. The brunette pushed thoughts of the library aside. That wasn't what she was looking for here.

But when everything else burned away, what had remained?

"Chris." The name rang clear and stable, the most effective blade to cut through the growing panic.

The name took him out of abstract fear and back into reality. With his panic ending he ceased in a sigh. "Sorry..I...got off topic." It took him a moment to remember where the track was originally."Your point? That doesn't excuse what I did to Marcus, I failed to control myself. Its my fault, and I deserve every ounce of resentment you all should feel about it. I betrayed my fellow man." With his panic settled and composure returned, he was again became a bit standoffish.

The choice to let it go or the choice to pursue relentlessly presented itself, but Siena was aware that it was a poor imitation of a choice at best. She didn't avert her gaze, held back the thousand thoughts that attacked her usual filters. It was easier to read someone that closed themselves off for so long, they'd never had to hide anything, wasn't it?

"That wasn't my point." Maybe it was at the start, claimed the small voice in the back of Siena's head, but it certainly wasn't at that point. "What they see you as and what you are can be two very different things." Words that she knew to be far too true. The brunette didn't voice that thought. "I might be giving you pointless platitudes, but I'm sure that the others don't see you as a monster." A jerk, maybe, but monster seemed to be a word reserved for the worst when it came to the rest of her peers. "It might go a long way if you try to make it up to Marcus instead of looking like you're running from the issue. We're supposed to be a team and all."

There was silence, another empty beer bottle at his side. "Thanks..but." He said before shaking his head, he still clutched onto a sober conscience. "It doesn't matter what they think of me; that won't change my resolve. I couldn't give a damn if you all hated me, and perhaps that's for the best." He said with a face that spelled a mix between spite and determination. "I can't expect Marcus, nor anyone, to forgive me for that. That isn't right, I have to correct my sins on my own. On the battlefield, we are a team, nothing will change that and I'm sure Marcus knows that as well, I don't need any of you to appreciate me for me to protect you guys." A long pause for the first gulp of his fourth bottle. "Its safer that way, to distance myself from everyone." With his spare hand, he gestured Siena towards the camp fire. "You belong over there, not here."

"Safer for them, or safer for you?" Siena knew the answer already, but again, she kept the thought to herself. Pushing herself to her feet, Siena dusted the sand still clinging to her skin away. "You said it yourself, everyone has seen terrible things."

The words were more than that, but she held it back again. Instead, Siena settled her gaze on the boy--not even strong enough to commit to being the monster he pretended to be. It was almost a shame, really. The cool, icy touch of Santana crept in like frost again. Such a shame.

"It would just be easier for everyone else if you weren't the most terrible thing that they've seen. You can't choose when you get to be a team with them."

"Both." He said flatly. Less pain for him, and the less likely others will die. Drowning his sorrows with more beer, Chris responded. "Just stop worrying about me OK? Its bad enough Angel already knows." Perhaps it was the alchohol finally sinking in or the stress of the situation, but that last part wasn't supposed to come out.

Something twisted tried its best to reach up, through the mist of other thoughts. A full bodied attack that slammed against the strongest filters that Siena could muster. A mental sneer mocked Siena, acid in every syllable it made. Wasn't that what she wanted to do to begin with? Silently, the girl pressed it down, contained the parts of her that she didn't like to present. What they saw and what she was were two entirely different things. An easy reminder for a difficult task.

'So what are you going to do?' Releasing a soft sigh, the brunette shook her head, the perfect action to cover the expression that threatened to take her.

"That's not really something I can do." Flashing a weak smile to the boy, she glanced at the empty bottles. "Try not to drown yourself in that, alright?"

And with that, Siena turned to leave.

Chris lifted his bottle in an attempt to bid her farewell in a casual matter, once again with the facade that nothing was wrong. "I'll be fine." The arbiter returned to his silence and stared at the black waves of the moonlit ocean.

It was obvious, as the evening went by and the sun settled, that Angélique had been drinking a bitt too much again. After a dozen bottles of various alcoholized substances, she was getting tipsy. Her worries and uptight attitude she had initially showed during the party was replaced by the giggling of a happy drunk young woman. As the silence and a quite mood began to creep onto the crowd that had gathered around the flickering bonefire, Angel, in all of her drunk glory, stepped forward and nearly tripped into the fire.

"H-hey guise... h-how 'bout we f-finish the night wih a lil' zwim? W-wouldn't be a beech partay wivout gettin' ourzelves wet, yeh?" the drunken Angel stuttered, but did not wait for an answer as she tossed her empty bottle next to the cooler and ran off towards the sea , tripping herself for real this time over a stray rock, which only emancipated an alcohol-induced laugh over her clumsiness.

Well, it was going to happen eventually. That didn't reduce the intense feeling of 'nope' that Zoe got as soon as the idea came up, tensing slightly despite her best efforts to appear relaxed. Lying back on the sand with no intention of moving anywhere, never mind towards the water, she called out to Angel dismissively. "Have fun with that. The volleyball was enough effort for me today."

Watching Angel trip, though, Zoe couldn't help being a little concerned. Not enough to go anywhere near the water, but enough that she wasn't confident leaving the singer to her own devices. Glancing around at the others, she frowned. "...You guys might wanna go after her, though. I'm not sure she won't find a way to drown herself."

Marcus nearly leaped from his position near the fire to catch Angel, as he was sure this was about to be the end of the rockstar. Fortunately, she didn't end up crispier than a forgotten pizza, and mearly stumbled off towards the ocean to invevitably drown. She'd had quite a few drinks, Marcus realized, looking around at the empty bottles and her slightly off-putting drunken giggles. It registered with him that he didn't think he'd ever heard Angel giggle.

"Should we...I dunno...do something about that?" Marcus followed Zoe's statement uncertainly, eyes falling to Emma first, and then passing over the rest of the group.

”Geez…” Emma said. She didn’t exactly like Angel, but it would be problematic if she drowned. ”I guess we should keep an eye on her.” Emma put an emphasis on the we, glancing towards Marcus before walking towards the water.

"Are we getting paid for babysitting?" Marcus shouted after after, giving one last glance over everyone at the fire and jogging off to follow.

"Paid you already in food, bro," Brent replied, dusting the sand off his swim shorts, "But hey, yeah, let's make more stupid decisions while we're still drunk!"

Well, he wasn't really, but somehow they had spent the entire day on the beach and not in the ocean, and the sweat that had gathered on him during the incredibly intense volleyball game needed to get washed off too, right. Warming up with a quick stretch, he followed along after the lovers. Strange, how Allison never showed. Did something happen between the two of them after all?

"Yo, Ernie, 'ena, coming along?"

"Hmm..."

The buzzcut Aberration didn't feel like getting swept along in someone's drunken rhythm right now, especially if that someone was Angel and if that rhythm involved ocean water that was blackening with every passing minute. Marcus and Emma should be enough, right? Ernie glanced around for an excuse, gaze finally settling on the group's meat plate, then on the dog lurking just behind it. His eyes narrowed at the four-legged thief. Perfect.

"There's still some meat to cook and I don't trust the dog to--hey!"

Another sausage had been stolen in the brief moment he was looking at Brent. Yep, he wasn't moving anywhere for Angel's sake.

If there was one thing that could act as a convenient distraction from the half eaten marshmallow (no longer toasty, melty, and warm) that Siena had made the mistake of trying to ingest, it was the fact that Angel was undeniably drunk. Drunk and about to jump into--nope, scratch that, trip into--the ocean. There were a number of words that Siena could have used to describe that particular disaster in progress, but it seemed that the others had that handled. Watching the events unfold made the girl acutely aware of two facts: that she should be glad that she didn't enjoy beer, and that Angel was not necessarily the safest person while drunk.

'...are that many of them drunk?' But Siena didn't have much time to think about it before the dreaded invitation to join the ocean "fun". If she could call it that. The brunette wasn't entirely certain she'd particularly enjoy the ocean, but the small part of her that demanded to try new things raised its voice to deafening levels. What were the odds she'd get another chance, after all?

"Oh, um...sure, I guess." Once more, Siena rose to her feet, popping the last half of the marshmallow into her mouth (much to her own dismay) while brushing the sand off her legs. "Sea salt's supposed to be good for a girl, right?"

"C'mon c'mon, you two! I know some folks here who could use havin' a good time together in the water." Angélique enthusiastically encouraged the two lovebirds, reaching for them and beckoning them further into the sea as she gave the two of them a mischievous smirk and a wink.

Whether it made sense for Emma and Marcus, Angélique was suggesting they could use this moment to be even closer. Ironically, while everyone seemed to have joined her to actually make sure nothing bad happened to her, Angel's drunken mind had appointed the young woman to act like a cherub or a beacon for everyone to enjoy themselves. If there was a previous animosity between Angel and Emma, and frustration towards Marcus, there was no trace of it right now in the singer's expressive behavior. It's like hate or distrust faded away into drunk happiness.

Marcus simply grinned, a slight blush starting to spread across his face in the growing moonlight. He shook his head and crossed his arms, chuckling awkwardly at Angel's insinuations. Still, after a brief moment, he gave Emma the same smirk and wink Angel had (perhaps less inebriated than Angel's) and adding a slight shrug.

He honestly wasn't quite sure where he and Emma were sitting. They'd not talked much since DC, save for the one instance in which they went over Determinations horrifying existance. However, he was reluctant to bring this up, in case he accidentally pushed them the other direction. They had plenty of other things to worry about, anyway.

He wasn't going to bring it up, but now that Angel had, he was interested to see the reaction.

Emma returned Marcus’s slight shrug with one of her own. ”Well, I guess it couldn’t hurt…” Emma said, a hint of hesitation coloring her voice.

Hearing the two seemingly in agreement over her suggestion, Angélique kept her ever-growing grin, chuckling in amusement as she began slowly drifting away from Marcus and Emma. She was drunk, yes, but no idiot, or at least it would take more than a dozen of weakly-alcoholized bottles of juice and beer to make her that stupidly reckless. Her goal was to bring people into the sea. She achieved that, so all that remained was to return to where the water wasn't so deep. After all, she knew how her muscles' motricity was quick to give out in moving water, especially when it was cold like tonight. It wasn't her first time swimming while under the influence after all.

"No need to look out after me, by the way. I'll just be swimmin' over there safely." Angel's magical whisper reached to the lovers' ears, making a point she had heard what they were saying about her earlier. She was drunk, but she still had keen ears. Alcohol didn't start deafening her.

"Probably not. But where's the fun in worrying about that?" Marcus said, drifting slightly out, allowing himself to float while looking at her. A task made considerably more difficult by the small waves trying to push him back into shore. "C'mon. Relax. It's a beach. We're basically on vacation. Come out here and live a little!" he said, trying his best to give a half-smile.

Emma gave Marcus a long glance. This was hardly what she could call a vacation, but it didn’t seem very appropriate to debate the topic. ”Yeah. Sure. Vacation from the usual maniacs trying to murder us.” Emma said as she started to slowly wade into the water. Truthfully Emma never was much of a beach person- there was something vaguely scary about the ocean, something about the depth, the amount of unknown. Usually she only went when Riley could coax her out, but it seemed like the beach was the right thing to do for everyone.

At least the day didn’t go too horribly.

As she was thinking Emma waded out towards Marcus, ”So, we’re in the water, what now?”

"Well..."

Marcus interrupted his own sentance by slipping under the water. At this point, it was deep enough that he could effectively kick without splashing, and he quickly swam around Emma. Or at least, he was aiming to swim around Emma. It was dark and he got a lot of saltwater in his eyes. And his nose. Basically every orifice you didn't want saltwater in.

For once in his life, he was fortunate enough to not have a horrible bumbling accident, and rose out of the water directly behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist. "Just relax. Look at the scenery. It's beautiful tonight."

"And hey, the moon and stars look pretty good too."

”Yeah, it is.” Emma admitted. It was night and the water wasn’t exactly warm, but she couldn’t complain.

There was a slightly hurt silence as Emma literally gave zero reaction to him, responding as if he were just talking about the weather. No, it was fine. Maybe she just didn't catch his attempt at a pick-up line. It was fine, people sometimes didn't get his jokes, these were no different. Just had to try again.

There was a slight pause as Emma tried to find her smile. The smile that she always had. It made its way onto her face as she squirmed around in his arms, flipping around to face him. There was no hesitation as she leaned in and kissed him.

Marcus returned the kiss, resting his dripping wet head on Emma's forehead after it finished, a slight grin on his face. Although the water was cold, he could feel the heat on his cheeks, and he took a moment to just reflect. This was all good. No horrible monsters. No psychological trauma. Just him and Emma. And he was happy with that.

"I think this is the part where I say something really cutesy and then you dunk me in the water." Marcus said, head still resting on Emma's, mischeivous grin spreading.

Emma paused. Something felt wrong, but her face didn’t change.

Marcus gave her excuse enough. She followed through with exactly what he suggested, grabbing his head and dunking it quickly into the water.

Of course, being his own suggestion, Marcus was at least prepared for the dunk, so he did not get another lungful of water. He did however get another eyeful, but that really did nothing but turn everything into a blur of color.

Fortunately, he had a counter move. He lunged for where he believed her legs to be, aiming to wrap around and pull them out from under her. A classic retaliation dunk.

Marcus hit his mark, sending Emma into the water, bit she quickly broke the surface again, returning to where she was with no intention to fight back.

Marcus quickly popped up in front of her, grabbing Emma by the waist and pulling her in for another kiss; before the saltwater had even finished dripping off him.

"Alright," he said, pulling away and shaking the water from his hair. "I don't know about you, but I am freezing. We should probably head back before we catch hypothermia or drift into a night current or something."

Emma nodded. ”Right. It is pretty cold out here…” there was something in her voice, maybe a hint of distance or discomfort. It was hard to place, but it was distinctly there.

Marcus stopped, his acute sense of emotion finally kicking itself into gear, after already having missed every other sign that something was wrong. There was something wrong, he could tell...and he would probably have to be the one to bring it up.

Life was much simpler when problems could just be ignored and he didn't have to worry that hard.

Emma frowned. ”I’m…” Emma let out a sigh, ”I’m fine. I think. I just… don’t like the ocean.” Emma deflected, a poorly worded and unlikely excuse, but knowing Marcus he could very well fall for it.

"Oh! Alright then. Let's get out of here, then." Marcus said wading back towards the shore with Emma.

It was a bad deflection; he'd done enough of those in his time to know one when he heard it. Still, he spent a few moments of silent wading debating on pushing the issue. He would much rather prefer to drop it...but there was a part of him that knew it wouldn't help. Whatever it was would just fester. Hell, maybe it had been for a while, and he just hadn't noticed. Maybe that's why they seemed so distant.

"Do you want to tell me what's actually on your mind?" He finally asked, lowering his voice slightly to avoid eavesdropping from the nearing beach.

Of course, he could tell. ”I…”

Fuck.

”I… feel dumb, after everything I said to you last time. Or maybe exposed. I don’t know. I don’t… usually talk to people about things like that. It’s making me feel awkward.” a part truth, but enough of it that she didn’t feel bad.

Marcus snuck his hand to Emma's, interlacing his fingers between hers. "Well, I'm happy to be the exception! Marcus said, shooting her a reassuring smile. "But you know you can talk to me if you need to; I'll always be here for you. No feeling dumb required."

Emma smiled back at Marcus. ”Right.” she replied, her voice a little more chipper. ”Let’s just go back to the others. I’m fine.” and she sounded like she was too. Of course, she wasn’t, but she didn’t need Marcus to worry about that.

When Angélique said she would be swimming, it was an understatement. Aftter she stopped drifting to a closer location where the water was just about her half her height in depth, she simply let herself float, taking a few glances towards Marcus and Emma from time to time. Seeing them together kind of left her envious. How much she would've loved to enjoy that moment with Allison too...

After a while, the cold water was doing a good job of sobering her up. Her mind was clearer as she gazed at the stars beginning to appear on the night sky. And she realized just now just how cold the ocean was during the starting days of October. However, as much as she figured it was probably time to get back to the beach, her muscles were sluggish. It was a good thing that the night current was pushing her towards the sandy shore, being so close. Trying to move her arms and legs to swim back to shore, she looked quite pitiful in her attempt to do so as she only looked like she was trying to redirect her floating to the shore and riding the night current.

While Emma and Marcus low-key flirted and had their weirdly suggestive fun, Brent was knee-deep in the salty waters instead, inching away from that increasingly embarrassing scene. Sure, it was night, but the moon was shining bright and his imagination easily made up for what could not be seen. Christ, how did they manage to be so embarrassing?

Turning towards Siena, he gave her a look, before saying, "Welp, congrats. You just had the entire beach party experience."

Siena had done her best not to pay much mind to her roommate and his girlfriend's endeavors--romantic gestures and her usual thoughts didn't generally mix well. Easier in writing than it was in reality, really. Instead, she'd found herself partially submerged in water that wasn't cold enough to be absolutely numbing, but enough to remind her that she should have brought a towel closer to the water. Pointedly keeping her gaze turned away from Marcus and Emma, the brunette gave her best imitation of a smile.

Ah, still angry at that? She'd figure it out later.

"Well, it could have gone worse." An almost cheeky statement, followed by a quick glance back to the campfire. "But it's nice to almost be normal."

"Best we can hope for, eh?" He smiled. "Let's get out before the cringe gets us both."

"Sounds like a plan." And a lot warmer than the water at that point.

"...should we pull Angelic out?"

"...is she still floating out there?"

"Yup."

Giving a quick scan of the area was more than enough for Siena to realize that Brent was right. Angel was still out there, though not quite as noisy as Siena expected a drunk swimmer to be. Well...as long as she was still seemingly fine...

"She seems fine for now. Not sure if that translates to us pulling her out of the water though."

"Mmm, yeah, probably's just enjoying the solitude while those lover birds get to it," Brent replied, walking back out of the water. At least the sand that had been plastered onto his legs was gone. "Maybe I'll show you the joys of a water fight some other day."

"And get salt water to wash all the sand out of my eyes? That sounds like a greaaaat time," Siena claimed with all due sarcasm while wading after the boy. Despite the words, the false smile started to give way to something a little more genuine. "Besides, even I know how a water fight usually ends when I'm involved."

"With a brilliant, one-sided victory on your part, having dodged every single droplet of water splashed in your direction?"

"Pffft, more like with me looking like the most pathetic stray left in the rain." As the duo finally made it back to dry land--'Ohhhh, shit, it's cold!'--Siena did her best to adjust her hair while walking. No wringing it out, she reminded herself, but with some modicum of effort, she was able to arrange it back into some semblance of a ponytail by the time they had made it close enough to the fire for her to make out faces--not that it helped with keeping it from clinging to her skin.

Ah, how refreshingly cool. Stretching out and enjoying the autumnal night breeze, Brent remained his shirtless self as he escorted Siena to the campfire. Ernie was still cooking while fending off the dog, while others looked to simply be relaxing now, drinking or sleeping. Mmm, night's basically wrapped up now.

"Guess it's time to bust out dem fireworks," the arbiter stated, turning his eye on his roommate, "Grant, wanna help me bring em over?"

Blinking and bringing Grant's vacant stare at the campfire over to Brent at his question, he thought for a moment. Figuring that it'd be more eventful than just sitting, he nodded and stood up, walking over.

With that, the two departed into the depths of the night.

At that point, Chris had nearly passed out with all seven of his empty beer bottles that barely made a pile next to his chair. He had noticed, in bitter silence, the others taking some time swimming in the dark waters. In his ontoxicated state, he only felt more anger. Anger for what he didn't exactly know. Was it still about Marcus? Is interaction with Siena? How he believed the others saw him, or worse? He didn't know, and he didn't have enough reason in him to care. His scowl had deepened as it continued to face the horizon. Well to hell with it, to hell with needing friends, to hell with the monsters that terrorize this world, and to hell with the monster inside him. Who cares anymore? How much pain did he need to experience before he finally stopped giving a shit?

After fifteen or so minutes of walking and hauling and setting things up and telling Angelic, Marcus, and Emma to get out of the water, Brent's pyrotechnic display was finally ready. Standing a good fifty meters back, Brent maintained connection with the arsenal of rockets through a long wire that stretched all the way from the ocean to the beach. This was totally going to work. It definitely wasn't going to explode. This was the second Overclock buff. The chances of a catastrophic explosion should be zero.

"Alright, y'all! Are you ready?!?!"

It took a small while for Angélique to finally drag herself out of the sea. Actually, she did a poor job of swimming herself back to shore, but with the night currents pushing her towards the sandy ground, it wasn't so complicated as to just let herself be slowly carried out back to the beach. Shivering from the longer-than-anticipated exposure to the cold water, the raven-haired singer joined the others next to the campfire, taking in the comforting warmth of the fire with extended arms. She just had arrived in time to ear Brent shouting about being ready. Ready for what? She did not see where he ran off earlier, too busy rinsing the sand from her body and bikini after landing on the shore like a cast off whale brought by the waves.

Ernie, having given up on fending away the ravenous canine and leaving the plate unattended, stood and cheered. "Light it up, buddy!"

His rope was summoned for good measure too. That flaming walkman hadn't gone unnoticed.

"Here we go!"

Silver lightning raced down the wire, intention passed down to the fireworks down below. With a hell-banshee's screech, the first rockets shot upwards in dizzying spirals, before bursting into scintillating webs of light. Four more joined, clusters of smaller color-bursts lighting up the sky as the smell of gunpowder began to underscore the explosions that sounded. Then, there was a sizzling, a fan of sparks streaming out from the water's surface, a pale orange light persisting while firecrackers shot upwards, cracking and popping while they ascended. Eventually, though, it all faded. There was a moment of silence, where only the afterimage of the firelight lingered in the air, before something in the water twisted, screeched, moved, unsettling the gentle waves.

And then, a final shriek, an arrow of flame that rose and rose and rose, almost scraping the clouds before it burst into a spectacular display of light, every color represented within that fire-blossom. Individual embers burst a second time, scattering into even smaller bits, and then did it a third time, filling the skyscape with star-like radiance, before falling upon Unit B like snow.

Almost like burning snow.

Except it definitely totally absolutely wasn't. There was no way Brent would have overlooked such a stupid error.

Marcus's child-like wonder quickly faded into joyful excitement as the fireworks went off, a show unlike any he'd seen before. Of course, it had it's drawbacks; flames were quickly decending on him. He gave a quick shout of surprise, wasting absolutely not time in diving back into the ocean. If anybody were watching him rather than trying to protect themselves, they might see his eyes poke above the water for a moment, the rest of him hiding in relative wet safety.

Angel watched in amazement at the fireworks. Wow, Brent's sure looked just as good as those ones she used to look at both on the first and fourth of July. Really, with his powers, he might as well just become a professional for every kind of job.

Or maybe not...

The hellfire that was raining on them, while looking quite beautiful, looked like scorching snow descending upon them like a punishment from heavens for their sins. Seeing that, Angélique's amusement turned into a frown. She was too drunk to run away like Marcus did, and she was concerned for the safety of others.

"Stay clear!" Angel barked her order, barely giving time to those around her to leave her side before taking a deep breath.

Then, like she had practiced so many times in the forest ever since she came to the island, Angel released a deep-toned scream directed at the sky, sounding very much alike what a choir at the church would sing at full strength. For sure, it sounded different from her usual ear-piercing screams, but the effect was just the same as before. This forceful shout pushed the flaming debris upwards and away towards the ocean.

Fireworks were supposed to be some fantastical, beautiful event, weren't they? Siena might have been able to appreciate the aesthetics of it if the entire process hadn't terrified her out of her wits. It was hard to appreciate the colors when her first and immediate course of action following the start of the display was to grab for her bag, clutching it like a security blanket with white knuckles. Her eyes remained glued to the colorful bursts, but the girl couldn't find it in her to take pleasure at the patterns. All she could think of were gunshots, of monsters in the distance as colorful lights scattered through the air, of sparks flying as metal slammed against asphalt, and of a hazy memory of being a prisoner in her own mind, watching as she raised a hand and--STOP.

A shudder ran through her core, something that moved from her gut out, too deep to stop--thank god her hair was still damp, she could at least pass it off as a sudden chill--but even that thought didn't get to last longer than simply sounding off.

'Stay clear?'

It was a different shout, but the images solidified again, and Siena felt locked into place. Feet rooted into the sand as though encased by concrete, eyes snapping out, around for danger, and--it was fine. It was fine, just a party and nothing was wrong, wasn't it? She didn't move from her place, only relaxed the grip on her bag. Normal. Beach party. Releasing the breath that she hadn't realized she was holding, Siena blinked away the fear, eased on an expression of lingering surprise, and still could not move her feet for the life of her, but it was fine if she pretended, right?

"U-Um...guess that's not supposed to happen...?"

Ernie stared slackjawed at the display. Reno New Years had nothing on this. A hand stretched to catch the firey snow just before it was swept away by a jarring scream.

Of course. Good things were so hard to come by with people like that on the team.

There was only a slight tinge of irritation before the buzzcut Aberration looked back to Brent. He was all too aware of the 4th of July stories, the statistics surrounding overexcited dumbasses who got a little too much bang for their buck. Brent was no dumbass but still...

"Still got ten fingers there, B? Nothing got charred off?"

While swimming in the ocean Kusari was startled by the sound of explosions going off. She'd lost track of time while diving, she hadn't swam in a while and was actually enjoying herself. She started swimming back to the beach as the sky lit up with colorful lights. She'd never seen fireworks like this, she guessed it was due to Brent's magic. As she reached the shore the fireworks suddenly became a bit too literal. "Wait... Isn't this bad?" She pondered with a worried expression, she thought they would have this handled. Right as she was about to run towards the group Angel let out a scream, which thankfully blew the fiery sparks away from the others. Not so thankfully however, Kusari was right in their path. "Nope nope nope!" Kusari jumped out of the way, tripping over sand and stumbling forward toward the bonfire. She tried to avert her course, but ended up stomping her right foot right into the center of it. She think she screamed something in Japanese, the same way her mother did whenever she stubbed her toe on one of her toys.

She'd have to add burns to her collection of horrible pains she'd gone through.

Hopping out of the fire she jumped on one leg holding her right foot, backing up until she tripped over a bag, which she ended up kicking into the air as she landed on her behind. She watched helplessly as the bag of sparklers she'd brought landed in the bonfire, quickly igniting and sending colorful sparks into the air around the burning wood. "Ffffffucking..." She groaned and shook her head.

Marcus, in his safety spot, was feeling very confident up until Angel's scream. Once the firey debris settled in the air and began quickly decendign towards him, he let out a startled "GAH!" before diving lower into the water. Fortunately, he'd had enough experience with the ocean to be able to hold his breath a fair amount of time. At least, until the last of the sparks sputtered out and he was safe to return to the world of air.

"HEY! Watch where you're aiming that shit next time!" he shouted, making his way back towards the beach.

Emma watched the spectacle with muted amazement and only a mild sense of fear- it wasn’t her first rodeo when it came to fireworks shows gone wrong. She may have been involved in more than one incident involving fireworks gone awry- it came with the territory when you spent much of your life as a dumb hapless teenager.

Who knew that things would devolve so quickly due to drunken assumptions? As Angelic went full combat mode, blasting away the snow with her screams, Brent could only facepalm. As Kusari ran into the bonfire, kicking her sparklers in there as well, Brent could only duck and die a little on the inside. When all those questions came up, Brent could only let out a long sigh.

"Was totally intended to happen," the arbiter said, swatting sand off his pants, "Part of the show, you know? Heatless embers and all that magical jazz...but yeah, totes get it. Mhmm, great oppurtunities lost, but hey, always a next time, right?"

He may have been a teensy bit salty. Just a little. Enough to season his fries in the future.

"And of course I got all my fingers, Er-"

The wire dissolved in his hands, the stress of the third buff finally getting to the object. With a little 'poof', the floating fireworks platform burst into flames, before sinking into the ocean like a Viking funeral.

"Alright, THAT wasn't intended."

𝔹𝕒𝕝𝕕 ℍ𝕖𝕒𝕕 𝕀𝕤𝕝𝕒𝕟𝕕 / / ℤ𝕙𝕒𝕟𝕘'𝕤 𝔼𝕤𝕥𝕒𝕥𝕖

The familiar volume of her grandmother's television roused Callan from the nap she'd been taking behind the couch.

"The silver and the gold are still available. And again, we only have a few of the ebony left, so get those orders in as soon as you can. These are absolutely beautiful. Five easy payments of--"

She lifted the magazine off of her face, amethyst eyes staring past the article about Sparrow and up at the creamed colored back of the couch which was covered in an assortment of well-known scuffs and marks. One cluster of blue scribbles in particular were quickly recognized. A memory she no longer possessed. One of a much younger version of herself who had managed to get a hold of a permanent marker one day. As she sat up, a deep laugh sounded nearby, morphing into a wheezy cough. She craned her neck to see her grandfather sitting in his usual arm chair, crossword puzzle book in hand.

"That didn't look very comfortable," he mused, running shaky dark brown fingers over the silver stubble on his chin.

Callan gave a short, modest laugh, "Well, you know me," she started, gaze wondering towards the hallway behind him. A tall mirror with a dimly lit reflection of herself stared back at her. "I can sleep anywhere," she continued pensively, curiously noting the dark brown hair framing her face. Was that important...?

"Is gramma here?" she asked, though she wasn't sure why. Gramma Webb never left the T.V. on when she wasn't watching. She half expected to hear her infectious laugh from the other side of the couch, coupled with some joke about her sleeping habits, but it was her grandfather who responded.

"No," he answered. He didn't sound sad, but Callan couldn't take her eyes off the mirror at the end of the hall to see his expression. "I'm sure she'd be rolling in her grave if she saw that fight, though. That was a close call."

"Fight?" The voice from the television turned to static.

"Yeah. With Hazel."

She wasn't talking with her grandfather anymore. The person sitting beside her seemed to resemble Lawrence far more, but she wasn't certain. In other ways, the person sitting there reminded her of several other classmates, but the book in the person's hand seemed like an easy tell.

"Who?" she squinted at the mirror but the lights were flickering obnoxiously, casting the end of the hallway into even more shadow. A figure now stood in place of her own reflection. The dated dress and short brown hair masking the girl's eyes seemed like an image straight out of a scary movie. But it was unmistakably Hazel.

Callan could feel her heart beating wildly in her chest. This wasn't right. What was she doing here? She didn't even have her mark. She didn't have her powers. She was weak! Defenseless!

Something came crashing through the ceiling. Tearing her eyes away from the eerily still personage in the mirror, Callan expected to see the nearly invisible form of her so-called ally's fist hurtling towards her. What she saw was far worse.

The memory of pain and her heart pounding in her ears as she felt her bones begin to crack beneath the pressure. A battle on two fronts as she'd grit her teeth while blood pooled on her tongue and Misery had tried to escape. She'd known she couldn't win both....

Just as the snarling fangs of Misery tore through the ceiling, maw wide and inviting, Callan awoke with a start. To a strange room with a strange scent. Stranger still, she found herself alone.

Slowly doing her best to piece things together, her eyes started to sting.

Callan pulled the unfamiliar blankets over her head and concentrated on her breathing. Now wasn't the time to get upset.

Too close. Who knew what state D.C. was in now? The same mixture of anger and panic from before settled over her. She felt ill upon realizing that the fight had gone on without her. The ice giant had only been one enemy and that was before Cat's Cradle showed up.

Throwing the covers off, Callan sat up quickly and reached for the lamp beside her bed. Her mind was racing too fast to even notice the collection of her belongings. She quickly jumped down and ran towards the door.

As her hand closed around the doorknob, however, she froze. She wanted to make sure her friends were okay, but if she ran into Hazel....

Was Hazel even still alive?

The answer to that question was too uncertain. It wasn't worth the risk. She locked the door. Callan moved back towards the bed and sat, gripping the bed's banister. She should just stay here. It wasn't safe for her to be around everyone.

Panic gave way to anger, but it didn't last long. She could have died! Why had Hazel attacked her? Just like Zoe! Just like... the sight of Misery batting Sander across Ground Zero came to mind. A dark, angry shadow monster tearing through fake building and people. A preview of what could have been.

Here she was, pretending like she was so much better than Hazel and Zoe. Even Sander....

How could she ever hope to be like Kadabra or Sparrow or any of the Precursors if this problem still plagued her. Her stomach growled, an irritable reminder of all the energy she'd expended... when? How long had she been asleep?

A quick glance outside the window was enough to confirm that she wasn't in D.C. anymore. She observed the view in silence for a fair amount of time before crawling back under the heavy blanket.

Everybody was fine. They had to be... even if they weren't, what good was she?

Memories of broken bodies and panicked screams in a city she'd been in awe of only nights before ignited a number of small, tired sobs, but sleep quickly reclaimed the exhausted arbiter before the weight of it all could overwhelm her.

So this one just needed some lime juice and Baileys. Layer the juice on top, then slam it back and...

Ernie's hand smacked onto the bar, grasping around for anything to distract him as his eyes bulged from the vile taste. This was, oh god, this was a really bad idea.

Seconds ticked by painfully before he was able to swallow the heap of curdled cream in his mouth, following which he sucked in a deep gasp and half a bottle of cranberry juice to erase the taste. Gross. Entirely gross. He didn't know why he thought that was a good idea. Shaking his head at his misguided curiosity, Ernie started rinsing off the shot glass.

Sander appeared then, strolling out from one of the connecting corridors, hands deep inside the pockets of his oversized hoodie. There was a fresh bruise on the left side of his jaw, its color stood starkly against pale skin. Despite the injury though, he looked relaxed enough as he took a sit at the bar, offering Ernie a quiet smile.

The signature blue cocktail and a bucket of ice were both pushed towards Sander. "If you say so, buddy."

Sander stared at the bucket for a few moments, obviously at a loss of what to do with it, before turning over to sip from his cocktail.

The next person to arrive wasn't exactly easy to miss, not that she was trying to be. Zoe approached the bar before noticing the others, pausing at the sight of Ernie. If she'd been in a charitable mood, or still busy lamenting her actions, she probably would have avoided him. Sander, she didn't know much about, but screw it she was in the mood for something interesting to happen. So Zoe sat down, directing a taunting grin at Ernie.

Because really, what was he going to do about it?

Sander regarded the new comer with curious glances over his drink. He knew of her, yes, had seen her at the flag and seek game, had noticed who was with Christmas during Wisford. He had just never had good reason to speak with her in person, though.

A cautious glance flickered towards the smiling ginger. Was she...trying to be friendly? How did she usually smile? Unconsciously, his guard went up, the persona of an amicable bartender firmly rooting itself in his behaviour.

Ernie blinked. Attempted a small smile. "Do you want something?"

"Not really." Zoe shrugged, faintly disappointed that he wasn't taking the bait. She glanced at Sander's drink, directing a polite nod towards him before turning back to Ernie. "Just don't have anywhere better to be. You got anything decent back there?"

"A lotta high-end stuff that could probably melt a hole through your liver. Got a preference?"

The buzzcut Aberration turned and feigned examining the shelves to hide the shit-eating grin he was failing to suppress. This was a good chance to compare Sander's alcohol tolerance to a normal human being. A chance for revenge too? Not that she had done anything directly to him. He just didn't like her that much.

Ernie started her with a Burnt Orange, something citrus-y with a decent hit of Grappa. Should hide the taste enough.

Accepting the drink without suspicion, Zoe didn't appear to catch on to Ernie's actions in the slightest as she took a sip. After a second, she nodded appreciatively. Even if she wasn't his biggest fan, she could appreciate being served a decent drink regardless. "Tastes good enough to me. Thanks."

When Emma entered the bar, she didn’t expect to find Ernie, Sander, and Zoe, a group she wasn’t particularly fond of. Between Ernie being Ernie, Sander being a roided out blood berserker, and Zoe’s vague beef with Callan she wasn’t exactly looking forward to having to deal with them.

But, at the same time, they did see the half of the battle that Emma missed, and there was still the question of Hazel that rested on Emma’s mind. She’d been locked up again, which can only mean… well, she did something.

So, Emma resigned herself to taking a seat. She offered a small wave to the others, ”Hi.” she offered cheerily, with no indication of her apprehension.

However, Emma wasn’t the only one to enter. Behind her came Determination, who followed hesitantly, taking a seat beside his master. Emma gave the golem a slight nudge, and after a moment of hesitation he offered his own, ”Hello.”

"Hey," Ernie nodded, fixing himself his own drink. Couldn't let those two have all the fun and if three people who actively disliked him were going to be his bar buddies for the night then he'd need something strong too, "Something for--"

If he was actually drinking something at the moment it definitely would've been spat out. He gawked at the shadowy creature, unable to muster anything to say.

Zoe kind of did a double-take at Emma's approach. Emma and her... friend. Zoe hadn't really seen the things much. She wanted to question why the hell Emma was taking one of her summons around with her, because the only reason Zoe could think of was as some kind of threat. At least until the thing talked. Somehow, that just made it more worrying.

Sander had been focusing on his drink, only glancing up slightly when the girls approached. However, Emma’s strange companion gave him pause. He hadn’t been around her long enough to know if this were normal behaviours for her, but given the surprised looks from the other two, the presence of this shadowy…thing was probably recent.

Regardless, Sander did not make any comment, instead just settled for watching the creature act from the sideline with a curious look on his face. There was no scent coming out from it. Around him, Ernie was Mudslide, Zoe was sharp and tart, and Emma was sweet, but when he focused on the creature, there was just…nothing. Like it wasn’t even there.

It reminded him of Callan’s shadow monster. The thought made his fingers twitch, his mind unhelpfully bringing back the blinding burn of its claws.

Sander knocked back his drink, fitfully chasing the memories away.

”Yeeeeah…” Emma said, smile turning into a half smile. ”He started… doing this after DC. I’d say you get used to it, but…” Determination himself remained quiet, looking down towards his hands, which were folded on top of the bar.

"That's uh...okay, cool," Ernie nodded rapidly and wondered if it was going to be a permanent fixture around the estate. Emma hadn't poofed him for some reason. Questions for later, "You here for a drink too?"

”Couldn’t hurt.” Emma commented idly. ”It’s been a… weird day.” Emma said, a not so subtle reference to her new found companion.

More nodding. Ernie poured out a quick White Russian for the girl (extra Russian, if the vodka's packaging was anything to go by) and a tentative glass of orange juice for the tulpa. Another Frostbite slid to Sander.

Emma gave the boy a nod, ”Thanks.” she said, taking a long sip.

Determination, however, looked at his drink with a bit of apprehension. He then looked at Emma as she took a sip from her drink, finally deciding on imitating her, knocking the glass back into his own mouth. For a moment his mouth drooped, as if he was trying to decide how he felt about the drink. And then he took another sip, and another, and finally found a small smile planted on his face, suddenly deciding that he liked orange juice.

Snapping out of her stunned silence as she watched the thing drink, Zoe laughed nervously. "Tha-- that's a new one." It definitely didn't seem to be hostile, at least. But it could drink? Did it even digest things? Zoe wasn't sure Emma would know, and more importantly didn't think she wanted that information.

After a moment, she glanced over to Emma. "Do you take that thing with you everywhere or something?" Even knowing it didn't seem aggressive, Determination's presence made Zoe visibly uncomfortable. If only because she had pretty much no way to fight it.

”Well…” now how was she going to explain this one? ”When he started talking he… told me he’d rather stay here. So yeah, it looks like he’s going to be staying with me now.”

Determination kept drinking his orange juice.

It'd 'rather stay'? So it had opinions. Likes and dislikes. Ernie shuddered inwardly, remembering the serial killings Lily had inflicted on the poor thing at D.C. If it disliked something too much, would it act like a human and retaliate? This was 'I, Robot' levels of potential bad.

"Well, you're always welcome to hang around here, Determination. Det. Deet?" He'd figure that one out later. Ernie looked to the little gathering at the bar, "But since we've got a couple of people here, anyone wanna do shots with me?"

Zoe shrugged. That was probably a 'no' to getting the thing to go away, then. Fantastic. Deciding it wasn't worth pushing the point or thinking about the wider implications, she turned back to her drink, shaking her head at Ernie's question.

"Nah. Don't feel like getting too drunk tonight." Though it would be clear from the slight blush on her cheeks that the redhead had a little more of a buzz than she realised. A look at her own glass, which... well, it wasn't empty, but had she been drinking that quickly? "Could do with a refill before you start, though."

Accepting the drink, Zoe laughed. "Not sure I'd go that far." Really, Zoe was anything but responsible when it came to her own health. Dying young wasn't too far down her list of priorities, anyway. She just needed to get over the damage last time had done to her dignity. And her face. Although saying that, she wasn't much of a drinker anyway. "It's just a control thing."

And her control hadn't been great recently.

He nodded sympathetically. "Yeah, gotta know your limits. How much do you usually have on a night out anyway?"

A night out? It had been a while, but... she smirked. "Whatever someone else is willing to pay for? Dunno. Not much. It all seems to hit me at once, so if I take my time I can see it coming before then. Should have a pretty good idea when to stop with this stuff, anyway." But the rest of it wasn't really an option while she was being careful. "Shots are a no-go today, though."

All at once. This was the part where he was supposed to feel bad, right? Ah well. "Fair enough. Emma? Sander? Det?"

"Shots are..." - Sander began, remembered the way the liquid had burnt as it went down. Then again, he didn't really have anything to do. He did not want to return to an empty room. At least with this, he wouldn't have to deal with it sober. -"Sure."

A moment of feigned contemplation. Emma had already decided she could use the drink. ”Sure. I’m in.” for Determination there was a moment of actual contemplation. ”What is a… ‘shot’?” at that Emma gave Ernie a long glance, ”Maybe it’d be best if we kept him away from the alcohol. I’m not sure what it’ll actually do to him, if anything.”

A clap of joy from the bartender. "Alrighty then!"

He got to work comfortably, producing a deep red liquid in twelve shot glasses.

"Made some for you too, Zoe, in case you change your mind. Are we toasting to anything?"

Sander only shrugged as he reached for a glass, though he did wait for others instead of drinking it straight away.

Still deciding against the shot, Zoe chuckled drily. "To not being dead yet? Isn't like we've got much to look forward to."

”Sounds about right.” Emma said to Zoe’s suggestion, raising her glass. ”To not dying?”

"To not dying, then." -Sander complied, mimicking Emma.

"To not dying," Ernie repeated, and knocked back his glass. Tastily sweet with a pleasant burn. Freaking strong too. Ernie'd be feeling that in a few minutes.

Raising her own glass with them, Zoe took a long drink and said nothing.

Sander knocked back the drink in one gulp, then quickly reached for another. He didn't start on the second one though, instead just craddling it in his hands as if admiring the color.

Emma also knocked back her own glass. ”So…” she decided to cut right to the chase, ”You guys saw the other half of D.C., right? I’d… heard one of the guards talking about Hazel. What exactly happened out there?” she said as reached for another glass, taking it quickly in one gulp.

Ernie sipped from his second shot, appreciating the taste. D.C. huh? So that's why she came to the bar.

He looked to the vampire and shrugged. "You were closer. Wanna give the deets?"

"Uh." -Sander blinked -"What's a deet?"

"Short for 'detail'. It's like what all the teeeens say," Ernie answered sagely, reflecting on his cringier early days at West. He finished his second and reached for a third.

"Alright." -Sander accepted the explanation easily, reaching over to get another drink -"What do you want to know, exactly?"

”Why my roommate, er, Hazel, is locked up again would be a good start.” Emma said, as she reached out to grab her third and final drink, not quite finishing it just yet.

"Is she alright?" -Sander asked, voice suddenly careful.

”I dunno. They wouldn’t let me in to see her, hence why I’m asking you guys about what happened.” Emma explained before finally knocking down the last shot.

"Oh." -That was all Sander managed, before he slammed back another shot, looking vaguely uncomfortable. After a moment, he finally began -"I...hurt her."

Emma sighed. ”As much as I hate to say it, Ernie’s right. Hazel’s my roommate, so I’m trying my best, but I know that she’s dangerous.” Emma said, perhaps a little unexpectedly due to her earlier defense of Hazel. ”I’m just… trying to make sure there won’t be any problems… and asking for my own peace of mind.” Emma said, trying her best to give an understanding smile.

“She’s…I mean…Hazel. She isn’t okay, you know?” -Sander frowned down at his drink, recalling the off scent of Hazel’s blood. He was not sure if he wanted to disclose this, but since Emma was Hazel’s roommate, he thought she deserved to know –“Her…She’s always so…different. Wrong.”

”Yeah, I know.” Emma admitted reluctantly. ”I mean, I live with her. I’ve seen it. At first she seemed like… a grown child. But it’s becoming a lot clearer that she’s dangerous. I’m not sure what’s to be done… how to send her in the right direction. Whatever they did to her… it messed her up.” Emma tapped the bar impatiently. ”I think I’m going to need another drink.”

"Drug."

Ernie passed Emma an orange-coloured martini. Yeesh, no need for such a hurry. "What, she's an addict?"

”Wait, you mean those pills she takes? I think the Institute gives them to her… I think. I figured they were… I dunno, happy pills or something.” she said as she grabbed her new drink, giving Ernie an appreciative nod.

"Does that...collar thing have something to do with it?" Ernie finished his last shot.

”Not sure. The collar seems important. Before the battle she took it off and made sure I hung on to it.” Emma said, taking a small sip from her drink. ”You’re not a half-bad bartender, Ernie.” she commented idily.

"He's quite good." -Sander agreed -"...at this."

Ernie's chest puffed with pride at the double compliment. Puffed a lot actually. Wow, it was definitely kicking in.

"Thanks! I practiced a lot," he grinned and added a faux-annoyed, "You sayin' I'm not good at other stuff, Sandman?"

Determination, up until now, had been staring at his now empty glass of orange juice. When his name, or what was close enough to his name to be recognized, was called he turned slowly. He pondered the question for a moment before finally landing on, ”I… do what Emma asks me to… and I exist.” he said slowly, pondering over the words. “I think I exist.” he quickly corrected, not quite ready to tackle the existential horror that was his current state.

Wow. Ernie was not sober enough for that kinda talk.

"You think therefore you is, right? Right, Emma?"

”Cogito ergo sum. Sounds right to me, although I’m no expert on the matter. You’re alive enough to think about existence, so that’s gotta count for something, right?”

Once again, a wave of absurdity hit Emma. They were in the middle of a very ridiculous conversation.

”I… will think about that.” was Determination’s response.

"And thinking is good for existence. You're doing a great job, buddy," Ernie pushed another glass of juice to the tulpa with a sloppy thumbs up. "Coggy toe uh-go sum."

He started preparing some more cocktails.

"I don't think that's how it's spelled." -Sander blinked.

"Definitely isn't." Zoe finally spoke up, having decided to focus on finishing her drink for the whole 'unstable teammate' discussion, and shot Determination a grin. "Nothing wrong with just hitting what someone tells you to hit, right? Worked for me so far!"

She laughed, oddly unreserved and at least a little drunk - she hadn't really been kidding about being a lightweight. "Doesn't really matter if you aren't made of fleshy bits anyway. Only difference is I can't go getting in a fight with you." Or Emma, by extension, which she seemed slightly disappointed about.

”Well, I guess we should count ourselves lucky than.” Emma said as she took another sip from her drink. ”Wouldn’t want to be on the receiving end of… well, y’know.”

"I mean, you could still fight 'im without meat-melting. Or are you one of those people that don't enter a fight if they don't know for certain that they'll win?" Ernie commented idly. Cocktails were getting poured faster than the group was drinking them.

Zoe gave Ernie a look. Seriously? Wouldn't the last two battles have shown she was anything but. "Nah, I'm just... not a complete dumbass, you know? Besides, I shouldn't have any reason to pick a fight now," her expression darkening for a moment, "should I? We're all friends here. Unless you can think of one yourself." And Zoe's eyes had lit up slightly at the concept, locking her gaze with Ernie. Determination could probably stop her, but quickly enough? That was debatable.

"Ewwwww no. Fighting always messes up my bar," Ernie whined, oblivious to any hostility, "Buncha jerks always wanting to glass each other, act like top dog. The floors are always sticky enough, why do they gotta get blood and shards and shit on it too? So unfaiirrr."

His mini-project was finished. Seven highball glasses, all in different colours of the rainbow, all with a different combination of the strongest liquor Ernie could find in the mini-bar. He pushed the arrangement to Sander with a little snicker and refilled everyone's glasses.

"I don't want anyone scaring poor Deter-mation here anyway. Look at him, he's been drinking his juice so well! Does he even have a stomach to digest with?"

Sander looked interested in the display of color in front of him, taking a few minutes to examine each glass before downing one after another in rapid succession. The burn of alcohol was most certain stronger in these ones too.

“Yeah. Fighting is…bad.” -Sander commented, licking his lips to erase the last remnants of the drinks.

”I’d prefer to keep out lil’ unit from coming to blows.” Emma said idly, continuing to sip from her drink. ”As for Determination’s stomach, or lack thereof… well, big guy?” the shadow golem looked up from his drink, giving what could best be interpreted as a vague shrug. ”Well, there we have it. More mysteries.”

"Each to their own." Zoe glanced at her glass, pushing it away. It was empty, but she didn't feel like having any more right now. Probably wouldn't be sensible, would it? She didn't remember being this easy to get drunk, but it at least wasn't too bad yet. "Guess we've all done enough fighting for most people by now." Came with having magic powers, she supposed.

"Sushpicious," Ernie muttered, sneaking a glance over the bench to look at Determination's seat. No liquid had passed onto the stool so that was something at least, "Yeah, shit gets real tedous when you're the guy cleaning after everything. Zoe, Sander, aren't your powers super messy? How do you deal?"

"My power...absorbs. I'm not messy." -Sander frowned, as if that statement had offended him.

"Like a tampon," Ernie snickered at Sander's comment. He pushed three more glasses each to Zoe and Sander, "Man, you gotta tell me this shit ahead of time. Coulda saved me from a shitty Wisford shower."

Blurry memories brought a frown to his face.

"Shitty shouting match too."

"I'm not going to clean blood off you, Ernie."

"Whaa, whyy?"

"Powers are not for...stuffs like that."

"After everything I've poured for you. Zoe?"

Zoe shook her head. "More trouble than it's worth."

Emma went to take another sip from her martini to find it emptied. ”Speaking of drinks.” Emma said, gently clinking the side of her now empty glass. ”What’s with the obsession with cleaning anyways, Ern?” Emma asked cheerfully.

The bartender shrugged and poured her another. "It's just better, isn't it? Nothing to get worried about if everything's clean. It's quieter that way." No one to piss off.

Emma gladly took hold of her new drink, taking a long sip. ”Sure? I guess I’m kind of a messy person, so… well, either way, you do seem to have a certain… talent for cleanliness. Maybe you should sign on as a maid here?” Emma teased, hoping that the jab wouldn’t be taken in the wrong way.

Ernie deflated at that. "Nah. The lady-maid said I was better off as an actor. Have to improve stuff myself instead of sitting around on an island. Price of power of changing the world."

He took a large swig of his own drink.

"Abes can't sign on here anyway. Not 'trustworthy' enough."

At that Emma took another sip of her drink with an exaggerated glumness, ”And here I was all ready for you to parade around in that frilly dress.”

"That... is not a mental image I needed." Despite her earlier resolution to stop, Zoe seriously considered downing one of the drinks Ernie had pushed towards her. Putting it down, she looked at the boy, nodding to herself. "Definitely not. And, uh, mind taking those away, Ernie? Could drink more, but I don't really want to."

Sander’s comment sparked a small laugh from Emma, which unfortunately coincided with her taking a sip from her drink, leading to a slight spill on the bartop. ”I dunno man, I think Ernie wouldn’t do a bad job filling out one of those dresses. He’s got a bit of an ass on ‘em.” Emma said with a coyly with a raised eyebrow, reaching over for Zoe’s abandoned drinks. ”Finder’s keepers.”

Sander did not respond to Emma's comment. However, he did lean slightly forward, very clearly looking at Ernie's ass.

Ernie, on the other hand, coughed out a mouthful of his cocktail. He thumped on his chest and reached for a washcloth, all the while trying to tame the flush growing on his face. "Why are you looking at my ass?" he croaked.

He spotted Sander out of the corner of his eye, to which he scowled and tried to shoo him like a fly. "Stop that."

The blood mage blinked, then withdrew quietly.

Looking towards the two boys, Zoe smirked. "Hey, if you two want privacy all you gotta do is ask." It was obvious that she found Ernie's discomfort entertaining, and she didn't even bother pretending to hide it. "I'm sure they've got spare outfits somewhere around here if you really want one."

"Sounds to me like you've been looking." Zoe looked at Ernie, laughing. Seriously though, if he knew where they were... in a moment of what was either drunken brilliance or stupidity, Zoe's face lit up. A wicked grin on her face. "Go fetch one, then. I dare you."

Emma took her final sip of her drink before continuing onto one of Zoe’s. She was definitely starting to feel it, but years of partying had prepared her for this situation. But the prospect of Ernie in a dress, though… ”Yes… yes! I endorse this.” Emma said, cheeks noticeably starting to flush slightly, although that was due more to the amount of alcohol she’d consumed than the thought of Ernie in a dress.

Endorse. Wasn't that a dolphin's body part? Ignoring the strange vocabulary, Ernie left with a bow and a snapped reminder to "wipe that shit up while I'm away!" A few minutes later he returned with a pressed, knee-length dress, albeit lacking in the headdress and stockings. However, he made no move to put it on.

"Dare was to 'fetch' a dress, not wear one," he snickered in drunken smugness.

"You know what I meant. Shame for you not to, after all that effort." Again, Zoe didn't really need the image, but her desire to embarrass the shit out of Ernie far outweighed that. "What if we... I dunno. You can dare me something after. Anything, 's long as I'm not gonna get shot." Yeah, that seemed like a good idea, at least in her current state of mind.

A more sober Zoe would have realised it was anything but. "That way, it's like... a game. All of us can do it." And she had absolutely no qualms about volunteering the others whether they liked it or not.

”Truth or dare?” Emma suggested slowly. The game didn’t have a good ending last time she tried it, but something gave her a feeling… no, maybe it was best not to jump to conclusions about the moral fiber of Unit B. She was, however, just drunk enough to stuff her qualms away and dive headfirst into what could very likely be a shitty situation. ”I’m down.”

"Okay." -Sander wasn't sure what the game was all about, but he could make a guess. Either way it didn't sound so bad.

The dress was embarrassing, no doubt there. But fuck, if it meant getting the opportunity to make these people do some really dumb shit...

It wasn't like he was gonna remember most of this in the morning anyway.

"Truth or dare then!" Ernie proclaimed with another slam of his drink and stripped down to his boxers. He'd put on enough weight in the past week to make the piece a somewhat snug fit. But his arms were bare and his legs were cold and the chest part was a gaping void and he didn't even know if he was wearing that apron-y part properly. Ah well, it wasn't as bad as a Hazel situation.

"This is..." he stretched his legs experimentally, "Feels weird." Looking around at his drinking pals, Ernie decided to go around the circle. "Truth or dare, Emma?"

Emma snickered as Ernie put on the dress, watching carefully. ”Damn. Gotta say, you wear it better than the maids.” Emma said with a not-so-subtle tone of sarcasm. When Ernie picked her first she gave a small sigh, taking a long sip from her glass as she mulled over the dilemma. She’d never been great at truth, but at the same time it was Ernie, and she had no idea what he’d make her do. She put down her drink, landing hesitantly on ”Truth.”

Perfect. There had been a question bugging Ernie the entire time. A stiff finger pointed at Determination accusingly.

"Does the big guy ever need to use the toilet? Seriously, where the fuck is that orange juice going?" Ernie blabbered, a look of horror slowly dawning on his face, "Oh my god, does he even have peeing bits?"

”Wow.” was all Emma said at first. Maybe she had totally misjudged the guy. She’d thought Ernie was some kind of manipulative dick, but… this wasn’t at all what she’d expected. Determination, for his part, gave a slight glance towards Ernie before quickly turning away, offering no explanation.

”I mean, no, he’s never gone to the bathroom… to be honest this is the first time I’ve seen him drink anything, since he doesn’t seem to need it. So I have no idea.” Emma glanced back at her summon, who once again offered only a shrug. ”And no, he doesn’t have ‘peeing bits’. He’d be clothed if he did, I promise.” Emma added as a quick afterthought.

A skeptical squint followed another lean over the counter. Sure enough, the tulpa's nether region was smoother than a baby's butt.

”Ohohohoh. Alright. Not much of a drinker, right?” Emma said with a coy smile, ”I believe these were yours.” Emma pushed her two remaining drinks, the ones that she had previously taken from Zoe herself, towards her with a raised eyebrow. ”Chug.”

"Those two?" Looking at the drinks, Zoe didn't seem keen on the idea, but it wasn't as though she was gonna back down from such a simple dare. One at a time couldn't be that hard, even for her. "You got it. One." The nearest one first, not downed particularly quickly, but not too much of a struggle as she placed it back down and moved to the next. It was clearly a little more difficult for the redhead to get the next one finished, but eventually the empty glass was triumphantly placed back on the bar. "Two!"

"So much for sobriety, huh?" Zoe grinned at Emma, well aware that she wasn't going to be approaching any good decisions for the rest of the night. Honestly, even if she'd had any kind of alcohol tolerance, it was starting to seem like pretending to be responsible might've never been possible in the first place.

”Wow, handled like a champ. Maybe I should’ve gone harder, huh?” Emma said with a toothy grin. ”Either way, you’re on Sander now Zoe.”

"Gotcha. Truth or dare, Sander?"

Sander pondered for a few moments, fiddling with the empty shot glass in his hands. Truth was questions, and he wasn't really comfortable with questions. Finally, he nodded -"Dare."

"...Man, I suck at thinking of dares." This would be easier if she knew anything about Sander. He seemed pretty quiet, she supposed? That was about all she had. Well, embarrassment it was, then. "Song. Sing something-- something romantic. Like a serenade." After a second's more thought, she grinned and pointed over the bar at Ernie. "Serenade our little maid buddy here for a minute, I'm sure he'll love it."

Ernie rolled his eyes but remained silent in favour of downing another glass.

Sander blinked in surprise, glancing back and forth between Zoe and Ernie, who was, for some reason, wearing a maid outfit.

“O-Okay?” -He stratched his head, taking a few moments to think of an appropriate song. He hadn’t been really interested in music back then, and after the Facility, he hardly listened to anything anymore. But there was still one song he vaguely remembered, as it was one of his mother’s favourites. She used to have it playing in the car all the time.

Memories flickered, and Sander grimaced slightly, thankful for the haze of alcohol clouding his thoughts.

It took just a couple of minutes for Sander to complete the performance, leaning slightly against the bar as he did. It was quite obvious that certain bits of the lyrics were replaced with random words, and Sander abandoned the entire last half of the song, unable to recall the complete lyrics.

It had only taken the first three words for Ernie to realise what song Sander was performing. Of course by then the buzzcut boy had already toppled to the ground like a felled tree, a disastrous combination of drunken sense of humour and incoordination. The mouthful of alcohol he'd been drinking had been spat onto his own dress. The rest of the glass suffered a similar fate.

Ernie spent the duration of the song shaking on the ground, almost completely asphixiated from his own laughter. It took almost a half minute after the song for him to regain his senses.

"Sh-she...oh my--pfft--jesus..." God, where to even begin with this? "Snrk...she said romantic, Sander..." he gasped. His cheeks were starting to cramp from all the grinning.

"It has the word 'love' in it." -Sander crossed his arms, suddenly defensive.

"What? Dude, do you even pay attention to the rest of the lyrics? What if the whole sentence was something like 'I love kicking dogs'?"

Once she stopped snickering - or tried to, at least - Zoe spoke, her words accompanied by an increasing amount of pointless hand gestures. "Hey, hey, 's fine. Not really romantic, but it'll do. Gotta ask Ernie now! Round the circle." Although Ernie had sort of done a dare by now, courtesy of her, she wasn't sure if it counted as part of the game. "Everyone's gotta go, right?"

Emma watched the scene with muted amazement before finally bursting out in a delayed laugh, seemingly taking a moment to process what just happened. ”I, for one, thought it was beautiful.” she finally commented, enthusiastically applauding Sander.

"Nah, nah, nah, this was my turn," Ernie gestured at the dress he was now dabbing down, "We go other way round now. Sander, truth or dare?"

"Uh." -Sander blinked, slightly confused by the sudden change in order. But he just shrugged and complied -"Dare."

It wasn't like he knew the rules anyway.

"Hmmmm," Ernie pretended to think about it before he leaned over to Emma and not-so-subtly whispered, "Heyo, can I borrow Determination for a bit?"

"I mean, uh... if he's cool with it?" she slightly-more-subtly whispered back, "Hey, uh, big guy, wanna help Ernie out real quick?" the golem got up with his usual sense of alacrity, almost as if he was still being ordered around as usual. “Okay.” he said after a moment of thought, walking towards them.

"Cool," the buzzcut boy grinned and turned to Sander with a challenging point, "The race of the century! Me and Det versus you and whatever power schtick you got. Two laps around the manor."

"I...I can't use my power for that."

"C'moooooon. A dare's a dare. It'll only take a few minutes and I'll never ask again."

Sander blinked, considering. He did enjoy races. But what Ernie was asking for was a bit too…much.

“I can do this without my power.”

"Urgh, but that's boring. Alright, new dare," Ernie shimmied out of the stained dress and shoved it in Sander's direction, "Put this on for me. It's too windy."

"This doesn't fit me." -Sander frowned, but he took the dress nonetheless.

Ernie ignored his protests and pulled his phone out of his folded clothes. "Shhhhhh, it wasn't supposed to. Now be a good maid and ask Zoe truth or dare. Determination, carry me."

He jumped into the tulpa's arms.

Sander sighed, but he didn’t appear to be completely against the idea. His shirt came off easy enough, then his jeans followed, but he kept his boxers on. The blood mage stood there for a few moments, stark naked save for his boxers and held the maid outfit up, fumbling with the laces and straps. He ended up undoing all of them before slipping the dress on, as it was the only way the outfit would fit.

It wasn’t really comfortable though, as the front was a bit sticky and the fabric felt scratchy against his skin. But Sander digressed. Afterall, wasn’t this part of the game?

It took a moment for Zoe to realise what Sander was doing. Oh. Okay, he wasn't leaving. He was just gonna... okay. Sure. Fine by her, and it wasn't as though she minded. If Zoe had been more sober, she might've had the decency to look away and at least pretend to give the guy some privacy, but she'd gone well past that point by now. All part of the game, right? As he finally turned to face her, she grinned widely.

"...Dare? Yeah, dare. Somethin' good."

"Uh." -Sander looked down at himself -"Do you want to wear this?" -He gestured at the maid outfit.

"You daring me to? Take it off, then." Zoe got out of her seat, pulling her vest off over her head. Pants too, though much like Sander she kept her underwear on for decency's sake. It only took a few seconds, and although really she could've just worn the dress on top of her clothes, that didn't seem to be in the spirit of the challenge.

If she'd been sensible about it, she would've waited until he already had the dress off, but by the time that occurred to her it was a little too late. Still, she didn't seem even a little self-conscious about her state of undress as she waited for Sander to hand the outfit over.

"Man," Ernie snapped a quick picture of Sander before he removed the dress, "If I'd known it was gonna turn out like this I woulda brought more outfits."

A glance at Zoe's undressing derailed his train of thought and he gawked at the sheer leanness of her body. For a brief moment it seemed he forgot what the redhead's power was. A curious finger reached out to poke her in the stomach.

"Woaaaahh, are those real?"

"One hundred percent." Zoe smirked, "If you're ever wondering what I do all day, that's the results right there."

"Really?" He didn't stop poking. Brent would how to get them washboard body parts, right? Ernie would have to ask him in the morning, "I wanna be you when I grow up."

While Ernie was occupying Zoe's attention, Sander struggled to get the dress off him. It was harder compared to putting it on, because some of the straps kept getting caught in his hair. Eventually though, he managed. However, as he held the dress in his arms, Zoe's partial naked body caught his gaze.

He looked, of course. Because Zoe was really worth looking.

"Nice of you, Ernie, but could you stop now?" As she spoke, Zoe glanced over to check Sander's progress with his own outfit, pausing when she realised he was already looking in her direction and-- Was he checking her out? Looked like it to her, because it definitely wasn't the same thing as Ernie's slightly strange fascination with her abs.

He didn't have the dress on anymore, and the more sensible part of Zoe told her to just take the thing and say no more about it. Sadly, that part wasn't in the driving seat right now. So, escaping Ernie's prodding and walking over to Sander, she raised an eyebrow. "Enjoying the view, are we?"

Ernie went back to his drink and whined as she left.

Sander closed his gaping mouth with a click; he didn’t realize it was open in the first place. The night air was suddenly too cold on his skin, and it only got worse with Zoe’s proximity. He turned away to look for his original clothes.

“Sorry.” -He quickly mumbled, holding the dress out for Zoe.

"Don't worry about it." The point where she should have stopped - probably would have stopped if any number of things had been different. If she'd known Sander better, if she hadn't spotted him looking, if she was less completely drunk. As she leaned forward to pick up the dress, she grinned, speaking quietly. "I didn't say I minded, did I?"

With that, she stepped back with the dress in hand, examining the straps and laces as she tried to figure out how the hell she was going to put this thing on.

Sander withdrew his hands quickly like he got burnt, before turning around to walk back to the bar, where all his clothes were. His face felt hot, but he blamed it on the alcohol. It took a bit longer than usual to put on his clothes, his fumbling fingers refused to cooperate. He blamed that on that alcohol, too.

Ernie watched Zoe, obviously amused by the difficulty she was having. Come to think of it, he'd never seen her wearing anything outside of shorts and stuff, had he?

"Having trouble there?" the buzzcut boy hopped down from Determination's arms and offered outstretched hands, "I've had to help a lotta girls back into finnicky stuff on nights like this."

"Li'l bit." It would take Zoe a while to figure out the dress normally, never mind considering the state she was in. But as soon as her brain absorbed the rest of his sentence, her expression became suspicious. "...wait, what's that mean?"

"Take clubbing outfits for example," Ernie rambled on obliviously, straightening out the dress for Zoe to climb into. "Man, sometimes those dresses have like twenty-five buckles all over the place. Really annoying figuring out which part goes where. Wouldn't want a girl going home with half her undies in the open. But even worse than that are those bikini-like ones with all the criss-crossing so ya don't know which hole is for what."

The outfit was held out and he gestured for her to get in.

"But I've only had one girl with something as complicated as that so I just stole one of the bath towels and asked her friends to help her home in that. She wasn't cool with it in class that week but what was I supposed to do? She'd pretty much thrown up on everything else I could've covered her with!"

"Okay, how many girls' clothes are you taking off?" Zoe had thought she was bad for that shit, but the look she gave Ernie as she stepped into the dress showed that she was quickly reevaluating that assessment. Wasn't he younger than her too? He looked younger than her. "I'm all for hooking up with people, but it sounds like you have a problem."

That, and thinking about it, it sounded even more suspicious. What the hell was he doing if they were too drunk to know how their own clothes worked?

"What, are you kidding?" Ernie looked at her with strong confusion. He thought the situation over as he started packing up the bar. Of course you'd take off drenched or vomited-on clothing, right? Plus, he was the only late-night impromptu laundry service in all of West. Drunk teens made for good pay, "They're the ones stripping before I can do anything about it." Drunkards always seemed to forget that 'give me your dirty clothes' wasn't the same as 'get naked'.

Wait, what was that last part about hooking up? Ernie neglected to address that part in his cluelessness.

"What?" Zoe's shock wasn't fading - if anything, things were only getting worse. "Dude, just cause someone's been sick on their clothes doesn't mean you can go feeling them up or whatever the fuck you're doing."

More confusion. He was supposed to wash clothing without using his hands or something?

"I mean, feeling's sortuva necessary part of the process. How else am I gonna get the muck off? Plus I don't think they actually mind if they're the ones paying."

Okay, that was it. Ernie was either a molester, or.... She looked him dead in the eyes, appearing completely genuine as she asked her next question. "...are you some sort of hooker?"

Somewhere at the bar, Sander spit out his drink.

"...what?!"

Ernie looked horrified, mopping up Sander's spill as he processed the question. His time with the Senators had made it very clear to him what a hooker was. And he definitely was not that.

"Ew no! Hell, I learned how dresses work from hookers. They're the ones that need the most help." A lotta really bad stains he didn't want to think about there. Ernie always kept a machine available for those late night ladies back in Reno.

"Taking drunk people's clothes off, feeling them up, getting paid for it..." Zoe counted the things off on her fingers. Despite the boy's horror, Zoe didn't seem convinced. "You're either a hooker, a nymphomaniac, or a really strange rapist."

Rape? AGAIN?! Ernie looked to Emma for help before remembering what her reaction had been in D.C. If anything, she'd probably already prepared a grave for him.

"I..." he choked up in his panic, "...what was that second one?"

"Nymphomaniac. Sex addict. Don't try and distract me with a fucking English lesson." Seriously? That was what he'd picked up on? "Point is, what the fuck?"

Sex...addict?

What the actual fuck?

"I don't have...s-sex with those people," Ernie's face contorted in disgust, like it physically pained him to say the word, "And I'm no addict. What the fuck is with you?"

"You don't... Wait." Zoe's expression was pure confusion as she tried to rethink the situation. She didn't think she'd been jumping to conclusions that hard. "Then what're you doing with them?"

"I wash the clothes they trash! Offer them my famous 'instant dryclean'. Sure, it's not instant and sure, it's not even proper drycleaning but they're usually too drunk to care anyway. West probably has no less than five parties going on per night so I go around and make some quick 'n' easy cash!" he protested, wiping down the bar with furious vigor, "God, you guys are fucking gross!"

"Oh. Oh! Shit, I'm sorry. Jumped to conclusions there." Zoe sighed, slightly relieved to find that Ernie wasn't as creepy as she'd thought. Even if the dry cleaning things still seemed slightly weird, it wasn't enough to be that bad. Deciding it was best to leave it at that, she focused on lacing up the rest of the dress with a frown.

Once she was satisfied, she stood up - oddly enough finding herself less comfortable with this than she had been parading around half-naked. The dress itself was a little tight, but nowhere near as bad as the situation had been for Sander - at least she'd been able to lace the thing up. It was just so... frilly. And pointless. And... ugh. Still, best to make the best of it.

"So, uh... how do I look?"

Ernie looked her up and down. Honestly, she just looked like a tall girl in a strange dress. But he was still angry so...

"Even worse than Sander," he pouted with crossed arms.

"Thanks. Can I get rid of it now? I think I was more comfortable with my clothes off."

The buzzcut boy merely shrugged and turned to the vampire. "It's his dare."

"Great." Zoe smiled, but it quickly faded when she remembered how much trouble this thing was to remove, clumsily fiddling with the straps and getting nowhere. There was a reason she'd needed Ernie's help to get in, and now she was pretty sure she'd tangled something up.

Still, she'd be damned if she was going to keep this thing on, lace or no lace. "One of you mind giving me a hand with this? I... might be having a bit of trouble." And she wasn't thrilled about asking for help either, judging by the look on her face. Appealing to Ernie first, if only because he'd been the one to help her into the thing.

Ernie started to flush again. Seeing a half-naked girl was one thing. Helping her put clothes on was another. But taking them off? Wasn't that like...really intimate?

He looked away, seemingly extra focused on clearing the rest of the bar now. "No flexibility under all that muscle?"

"I'm as flexible as I need to be. Just... cant be bothered figuring it out." Zoe shrugged, not really seeing an issue with what she was requesting. All they really had to do was sort out the lace - the rest, she could do on her own. "Too much effort."

"Effort?" Pleeeeeeeeeaaaassee don't make meeeeeeeeeeeeeee. "I didn't take you for the quitting type. C'mon, it'll be a good learning experience."

"You think I'm quitting?" Zoe's expression was suddenly determined. Still didn't see what the problem was, but he was right, it was a challenge! Zoe didn't lose challenges. Nope. That was for other people. "Fine, I'll do it later. Not-- not gettin' beaten by some dumb dress."

Which, sadly, meant she had to keep the damn thing on for now. "Gimme another drink or something, then." If she was stuck keeping this thing on, then she needed it. Being sober was more than a lost cause at this stage.

Oh. That wasn't what he was...yeah, okay. That's fine.

With a weak nod, he slid another glass to Zoe. "Emma's turn then."

"Yeah, sure." Zoe turned towards the other girl with a grin. "Truth or dare, Emma?"

Up until now Emma had been keeping her head down, watching the display before her with quiet save for the occasional giggle and the more occasional outburst of laughter. Determination, meanwhile, free of his Ernie carrying duties moved back to his seat, returning to pondering whatever the creature spent his time pondering.

”I… guess I’ll do truth again,” Emma said, ”And I could use another drink.” she said with a small nod towards Ernie. He complied easily.

"Truth, huh..."

Zoe appeared to think for a minute, before shrugging. She wasn't exactly up to thinking of an original question, and didn't feel like prying into Emma's relationship was something she had any interest in doing. Didn't know enough about Emma to have any really good questions either, so she decided it'd be a good idea to just stick with one of the classics. "Most embarrassing thing you've ever done?" Unoriginal, but hey, what could you do?

”Well shit, let’s see…” Emma gave an exaggerated huff before taking a small sip from her drink. ”I’m a little spoiled for choice, unfortunately.” Emma tapped her finger against the bar, trying to pick out a specific memory. ”Oh shit, I got it.” Emma leaned over the bar, glancing at the other three, suddenly ready to launch into storytelling mode.

”Now, mind you, I feel into what most parents would qualify as a ‘rough crowd’ in high school. I also went to a fairly… affluent school. I wasn’t rich per se, but I guess I handily fell into that ‘rich-wild-high-schoolers-pissing-away-their-education’ clique. Just for, uh, context’s sake… and so you know that everyone involved in this story is going to be really dumb.

Emma paused, taking a long sip from her drink.

”Anyways, this is, appropriately, going to be one of those first time drinking stories, so strap in. I think it was, uh, when I was a freshmen when my gir-“ Emma stumbled over her words for a moment before landing on what she wanted to say, ”When my best friend Riley convinced me to go to a party with her. Naturally it wasn’t the first time I’d drank, but it was definitely the first I drank in a crowd. Now, at this party, there was this girl… Britney, I think. And Britney was kind of a huge bitch. Me and Riley had some beef with her. I think it was over, uh…”

Emma sighed, apparently not coming up with an answer.

”Well, that’s not the important part. Let’s just say she it was on account of her being a bitch. Me and Riley go to this party, and we both resolve to get piss drunk. I think Riley talked me into it because it was my first party and we just had to go all out. Of course, when we start hitting that ‘very drunk’ point we see Britney, and I think she says some kind of jeer, or maybe we did, I don’t exactly remember. But Riley decides, and I quote,”

”I’m going to wipe the smirk off this bitch’s face!”

Another sigh.

”Riley always was a bit of a spitfire. But I digress, she decides on putting her dukes up with Britney. Which she does, and they start going at it. But now, the embarrassing part starts when Riley calls on me to back her up when one of Britney’s friends starts to get involved, and being the caring friend I am I do. But I am, by no stretch of the imagination, much of a fighter. And I was also really drunk at this point. So I get up, put up my fists, and drunkenly charge… right into Riley’s back, sending us both onto the ground. Of course, at this point, being a dumb kid that has gone far past the limit of how drunk I should be, I also lose my lunch all over her. And so endeth my career as a fighter, in a pool of my own vomit with not just Britney and her friends laughing at me, but the entire room.” Emma finished with a small bow, taking a much needed swig of her drink.

Ernie blinked, eyes wide open in total surprise. He guessed he should've known from the way Emma was handling her drink throughout the night's game but...wow. Apparently drunk idiots existed outside of Reno felons and bored West brats.

'Rich-wild-high-schoolers-pissing-away-their-education.’ Typical.

Not now.

"This...is exactly why I offer laundry services," he said slowly, a tentative smile on his face, "Do I need to confiscate that drink from you?"

The story intrigued Sander. Most things about high schools and youth and everyday life tended to, but he didn’t offer much commentary, instead just focused on nursing drink. He was tempted to ask more about it, but then again, Emma might ask for a story of his own.

And he didn’t have anything to share.

”No worries. I’ve gotten a lot better at holding my drinks,” Emma took a long sip from her drink to accentuate her point, ”We’re back around again, aren’t we? Another round, Ernie? Truth or dare?”

"Mm," Ernie hummed doubtfully, "I don't think you'd be surprised at how often I hear that."

The bar was completely cleared now, save for the glasses still in his companions' hands. Closing shop for the night. He wasn't keen on potentially getting accused of other weird shit anyway.

"This'll be my last one before I head off to bed. Truth, so I don't have to clean anything else up."

”Hmmm, alright then. Truth…” Emma took a moment, trying to dig up something that wouldn’t be overly confrontational, finally landing on the relatively mundane, ”First kiss? Have you had one? If you have, give us the deets.”

The boy felt an instinctual shiver travel down his spine. Not much story to tell there. Wasn't something he wanted to tell anyway.

"Drunk girl who thought it'd be funny," he murmured, his eyes narrowed, "It was gross. That's pretty much it."

”Gross? What, on account of her being drunk, or…?” Emma probed lightly with a raised eyebrow.

He raised his hands in helpless protest. "I dunno, it just was? Sure, she could've used a mint but in general just..." he grimaced sharply, "Being close to people I don't know like...that? It's weird."

”Alright. Fair enough. No further questions.” Emma said, looking down at her quickly emptying drink. She felt a light tug on the hem of her shirt that she quickly recognized as Determination. ”I am ready to go.” she was unceremoniously informed. ”Gettin’ antsy big guy? Alright, feel free to head on back. I’m gonna finish my drink.” at that Determination gave a quick nod and a hesitant wave at the rest of the group before heading for the door.

”Well, looks like I’m almost out.” Emma said, considering the drink before her.

"It was fun while it lasted. " Guess that meant she really was stuck with the maid outfit now.

Looked like the game was over anyway, if Ernie and Emma were both ready for sleep. Although she didn't ask for another drink, having reached the limit of how much she could have before throwing up, she glanced over at Sander. Two was company, she supposed, even if it wouldn't be quite as lively. Besides, she'd admit she enjoyed tormenting the poor guy, cruel as it was. "If those two are going to bed, mind keeping me company for a while? Don't feel like sleeping yet."

"Um...sure." -Sander agreed easily, though he did shoot a few longing looks at the various bottles on the shelf. The alcohol had barely managed to make him tipsy, after all. -"Are you sure you don't want...change? The dress is a bit sticky at the.." -He trailed off at that, and looked back down at his empty drink.

"Trust me, I've noticed. It's not the most comfortable thing in the world," Zoe grimaced, pulling at the fabric, "but like I said, I'm having trouble figuring it out. Probably should've done what you did and left everything open." If only Ernie hadn't decided to be helpful and do it all for her, she wouldn't have this problem. Not that she could really blame the guy for this one.

"I think it look better if you...close everything." -Sander mumbled.

"Oh. Guess it's got some kind of use, then." Zoe looked surprised for a second. That was interesting to say the least, and she stood up, looking down at the outfit with a grin. At this point, she wasn't sure whether she was coming on to Sander or trying to screw with him or both - but whatever it was, Zoe was as subtle as a brick. Gesturing at her outfit, she grinned.

"So, everything look closed up properly to you?"

Sander suddenly looked alarmed, but he did look and that was probably a mistake.

“I…uh…That looks…yeah.” -He swallowed drily, the remnants of his drink sour and acid in his mouth –“It looks good on you.”

"That right? I've gotta say..." Zoe looked him up and down. It wasn't as though he was bad looking, and they weren't friends. Not like she'd have to spend any time around him later, so it wasn't as though he'd be able to get the wrong idea...

You know you'll regret this when you're sober, right?

But right now, Zoe didn't really care. "You look pretty good yourself. Kinda preferred you without the shirt, though."

“O-Oh. Thanks. You too.” -Sander said quickly, recalling Christmas’ behaviours from that night he was drunk. Was Zoe feeling the same? In that case, she might begin acting strange soon, and Sander wasn’t sure he would be comfortable with that –“Are you okay? Do you want some water?”

"Water..? Nah, 'm good. Great, actually." Zoe paused, appearing to think for a second. No, that wasn't right. "What, you want me to go away or something?" She looked at the unfortunate vampire, a hint of concern creeping in to her expression. If he seriously minded, then it wasn't like Zoe would keep going. That wasn't really her thing.

"I mean...if you want." -Sander shook his head, shooting Ernie a look -"But water would help a lot. If you want."

Ernie, who'd been struggling to choke down his laughter by holding his breath the entire time, nodded mutely. A glass of water slid in Zoe's direction and he continued intently cleaning the bench, despite having already wiped it down about three times prior.

"Oh, uh, thanks." Ernie was still here? Zoe looked at the glass for a moment, taking a long drink before sighing. "There. 's that better?"

"Do you feel better?"

Zoe frowned. "Never really felt bad anyway, so... I guess?" It would take more than a glass of water to sober her up at this point. After a second, she gave Sander a look that was mixed parts concern and confusion. "...Are you okay?"

"Liquor tolerance of a goddamn grizzly bear," Ernie managed to squeeze out, only coughing a little bit through it.

He grabbed a random bottle of high-end spirits and uncapped it for Sander. "Down it."

"Now?" -Sander frowned, but he reached for the bottle nonetheless.

"I believe in you."

He couldn't get drunk? Sounded to Zoe like that was probably an exaggeration, anyway. What, he had some kind of super liver now? Sure."Yeah, rig--"

...Wait. What reason would there be to lie about that? None, as far as she saw, that would be worth the trouble. Which left one option - it was completely true. Sander couldn't get drunk. Suddenly, Zoe felt like the water had done wonders for her sobriety. The expression that crossed her face was a perfect picture of instant regret, the redhead's already pale complexion becoming downright ghostly. You've got to be fucking kidding me.

Sander threw his head back to drink a gulp straight from the bottle. The burn was terrible, which prompted him to push the bottle away and took one long look at the label, wondering if Ernie gave him the toilet cleaner again.

Snapping out of it a little, Zoe looked at Sander, her moment of realisation passing. "Feel like I might've come off a little strong." Understatement of the century, right there, but she'd have felt better if he hadn't been pretty much sober. She grinned, at least finding some humour in the situation. "You probably think I'm a complete weirdo, huh?"

"Hmm?" -Sander paused a bit, tilting his head -"Why?"

Emma’s drink was rapidly disappearing. She shot Ernie a slight glance, but decided not to interrupt the moment. The buzzcut boy gave her a quick shake of the head and filled her glass with plain water instead. He was clearly struggling to hold in a shit-eating grin as he returned Emma's glance.

"But it's--"Wait, so he didn't mind? Zoe was just confused now, because she was pretty sure she'd forgotten the concept of shame for the past few minutes. Not that the idea had completely gone away, but it worried her more to think that at least one of them would remember all this tomorrow. "I mean... if you're not interested, you can say so. Don't gotta put up with my crap just 'cause I'm drunk, y'know?"

"It's fine." -Sander only shrugged before taking another swig from the bottle. He made a face at the taste, pushing it toward Ernie -"You didn't mean it. I think you were a bit tipsy."

Wow. Zoe guessed she was lucky that Sander was understanding about this shit. "Didn't... didn't think I'd be this drunk." Zoe groaned, looking over at Ernie and Emma as though just remembering their presence. Oh, shit. If it was possible for her to feel any more embarrassed than she did already, knowing she'd had an audience was the way to do it. She didn't sound hopeful, but...

"'S it too much to ask that you guys never mention any of this again?"

Ernie looked like a deer caught in the headlights. It didn't seem like he'd be able to say anything without completely cracking up so he drank deeply from a glass of water instead, taking the time to contemplate an answer. It didn't help. Following a deep breath, he started to scratch at his face to hide the upwards turn of his lips.

"Mistakes...happen..." he managed, gritting his teeth to suppress the thunderous laughter that threatened to burst out. A rapid, mute nod would have to make do in the place of an actual answer.

Zoe looked unconvinced. And wasn't finding it nearly as funny as Ernie. God damn it. There weren't many things that would get her doing this, really, but sometimes you had to take desperate measures. Not violence, not aggression, those wouldn't do anything but encourage him - especially knowing they didn't really like each other. So instead, Zoe fell back on something she really wasn't used to. "...Please?"

Huh. He didn't think she had that word in her vocab. Ah man, if she was gonna be so sincere about it...

Ernie sighed and gestured around the group. "Keep the maid shit and rape accusations between the four of us and you've got a deal."

"I'm still sorry about that. Sounds like a deal." Zoe muttered apologetically, before nodding. If that was all it took, then it wasn't even a decision. "I think... think I should go sleep." At least while she was still thinking straight.

The buzzcut boy nodded and waved her off. "Make sure you drink some water before you turn in for real."

"Yeah. I'll do that." Bundling up her previously-discarded clothes, Zoe made her way out of the bar, hoping against hope that she wouldn't remember any of this in the morning.

With the flesh-melter finally gone, Ernie let out a loud exhale. That was one threat of death out of the way. He turned to Sander. "Any other plans for the night?"

Sander shrugged again, looking at the half empty bottle in front of him -"I think I will go too." -The blood mage finally concluded, rising to his feet-"Good night, Ernie."

"You too, Sander. Don't let the bedbugs bite."

And with another wave goodbye, only two remained at the bar. Ernie finally let himself go, cracking up and slapping the bar as tears of disbelief threatened to spill. Laughter shook his entire frame.

"Now that," he snickered, "was a night."

Ernie’s display drew a small snicker from Emma. ”You can say that again.” Emma took a sip from her drink, a little disappointed that it was just water, ”I mean, those two aren’t great at subtlety.”

"Subtlety? Please. I bet she could've smashed a brick with the words 'you're super hot' into his face and he still wouldn't have noticed."

He took a sip of his water, his grin taking on a more cunning note.

"Or cared."

”Hmmm… yeah, Sander didn’t seem to be picking up what she was putting down. A little surprising too, I mean, Zoe’s pretty good looking. I guess she can be a little… abrasive.” Emma said carefully, making sure not to give Ernie too much.

"Nah, nah, nah, nah, you're looking at it all wrong," he shook his head wildly. Something diabolical seemed to exude from his aura now, "Why do you think I made him my Pretty Rainbow Shot Special earlier tonight?"

”Uhhhhhhhhhhhh…” was all Emma had at first, ”Well, that’s none of my business. Dude can be interested in whatever gender he wants.”

"Yeah, yeah, that stuff. Anyway the vamp's only here cos his boi Christmas isn't back yet," the boy chuckled, "Zoe was going after a lost cause the entire time."

”Right. Well, no skin off my back. Sucks for Zoe, I guess, but that kind of stuff happens when a buncha people get drunk.”

"Awww man, I thought you'd find it funny. Whatevers, brah," Ernie flicked through his phone, "Blackmail material, blackmail material. Drinks, accusations. Even a new friend! Overall a very successful truth or dare. Thanks for coming."

There it was.

Of course, Emma should’ve known. She’d been right about Ernie. Always another angle. ”Right. Not a problem.” Emma said, draining her drink. ”I think Determination’s probably getting lonely, so I’ma head off.” she said with a small wave, already starting to get up and leave.

"Mm, seeya," he waved back lazily, not even looking up from the treasure trove on his phone.

He'd been too rash. His limbs had had that familiar, vicious energy trembling through them. They'd thoroughly shattered whatever he'd had with Angelique.

Good.

Ernie sighed with disappointed realisation as he tossed the day's outfit into the washing machine, entering the settings he needed before popping on a podcast to pass the time. It had taken him a while to get all the splinters out and even longer to select a fabric softener from the myriad at his disposal. It was a launderer's paradise, perfect aftercare for a bratty teen's Stigma sating session in the woods.

There was too much to think about, always too much. His uselessness, his classmates, Fracture, East, D.C. Murderers, dreams, powers. So damn much. God, it was enough to drive a guy insane. The confrontation with Angel had just been another handful of straw on the camel's back. Nothing would change even if he committed. He just needed to stop thinking, to fucking block it out or he was, oh god, he would--

A sudden beeping snapped him out of his fervor. Not his own machine. There was still a half hour before he'd be done. One of the maids hurried over from a distant corner in response to the timer going off. Ernie noted the dress and the mark on her face with a raised eyebrow.

As she unloaded the machine, the Aberration removed an earbud and called out. "Do you need help with that?"

The bespectacled brunette turned, regarding Ernie curiously. A smattering of freckles across the bridge of her nose gave her a childish look, but her voice was that of a young woman's.

"You're a guest here? We can't have the guests work--that'd be sacrilege!" she answered with a quick laugh, pulling another bundle of sheets from the dryer and loading it into the laundry cart beside her.

'Sacrilege' was a bad thing, right? Ernie decided to ignore it and just laugh along.

"It's not work if you're having fun? Don't worry, I like this sorta stuff. Just didn't want to mess up any of the sheet sortings here so I thought I should ask for permission first."

"I can't allow a guest to work, I'm sorry," the maid repeated, adjusting her round glasses when the movement of placing the sheets into the metal cart tipped them slightly askance.

"Mm, I guess that's fair," Ernie sighed, dejected. He could relate. If some random patron decided to try and interfere with backdoor operations, Liam would have slapped them silly.

The Aberration watched the rinse cycle a little longer before anxiety could overtake him again.

"What's your name, miss?"

"Elvia, but everyone calls me El," she replied, turning properly to look at Ernie now that her hands were free. "Were you looking to get some laundry done?"

"A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Ernie. Did you need something more, then? I'd be happy to assist you." The maid followed the statement with a practiced curtsy, the movement automatic for her now.

Ernie couldn't help but get the feeling that he was in the way of something. But this wash cycle still had thirty minutes to go and he'd been meaning to ask someone about this anyway.

"You could tell me about the subnaturals on this island. Are they all from the USARILN system?"

Elvia looked at him curiously, but her answer was casual. "In a sense, yes. Sometimes more trustworthy subnaturals are given the option to live here instead of the Institute, though supplies are a bit less forthcoming. I should clarify that very few on this island have any raw combat capabilities, if you were curious about what we can do."

"Ah, I wasn't planning to fight anyone if that's what...uh..." his voice petered off, unsure of where that particular thought was going. So 'trustworthy' subs didn't include Abes. It made a cruel sort of sense. Even if Zhang managed whatever was going on on this island, she probably wasn't going to go through with unnecessary expenses for Stigma control. The lack of combatants explained the absence of guards before the group's arrival too.

"There's some kinda law that lets subs go unsupervised in big places like this? You guys aren't under a slave contract, are you?"

"The only law here is one we enforce. If someone wants to escape, well, I suppose they can do that. But there's little to run to that would welcome them around here." She tucked her hand into a pocket of the dress beneath the ruffled lace apron, withdrawing what looked like a folded envelope. Flicking the fold of paper open, she withdrew a rectangular piece of paper that she then turned towards Ernie. It was a paycheck of 7,000 dollars dated for the 27th of August, 2020--a personal check, rather, with the Director's full name and USARILN East's address in the top left corner. "If you think seven to twenty thousand a month is slave wages, I suppose we are under a slave contract," she said, a light laugh following.

"Woooaahhh," Ernie's eyes bulged at the sight. So that's what a paycheck look liked. Of course, this only raised even more questions.

"East probably becomes a nightmare to live in after a while so this place is actually a really nice opportunity, huh?" Ernie commented before his face soured, "Wait, and Zhang invited you here?"

"Who else could?"

Ernie contemplated the question for a moment. Kleinfelder...?

...

...Nah. Not even as a joke. Everyone could see through that asshole's star-spangled facade.

This was weird. He couldn't think of a hidden agenda behind all this. Not at the moment anyway.

"So there's no monitoring like at the Institutes? Ankle cuffs? You can use your powers freely?"

"Yes. Here, we just live. Freely."

The closest thing to freedom Ernie had ever seen. Not the real thing. They couldn't leave the island or travel through cities without those hateful stares. It was better than the Senators at least. Better than whatever this Unit B was.

Freedom. He wanted this sort of thing.

"Some kind of paradise then."

"Don't look so eager to join us," Elvia laughed, catching the avid stare on Ernie's face. She pulled off her glasses, cleaning the dust of the laundry room from the lenses. " 'The world's inhabitants can be categorized into actors and observers,' " she said carefully, repeating the Director's words to her over a year ago. "We who remain here can only observe and wait. Perhaps things will improve? Perhaps they will never. But none of us get to decide that fate."

She replaced the glasses on her face, smiling sadly at Ernie.

"But actors must carry their own crosses. That's the price they pay for the power to change the world."

Ernie blinked, a sudden and very noticeable discomfort overtaking his system.

He'd never asked for that power. He never wanted the burdens of expectant observers like Elvia on his shoulders. Changing the world, influencing it with his own power? He couldn't do that. Angelique had made it quite clear that he couldn't divert what his classmates were becoming. D.C. had shown him that his inaction would only lead to suffering. Improving himself was a joke that he'd stopped laughing at a long while ago. It was quite clear that he was a useless sack of shit, incapable of doing anything for himself or for anyone else.

And yet, he was the one with the power of endurance. To persevere, to survive everything the world had thrown at him in these sixteen years of life.

There was no reason to his existence. Logic stated that he should have died many occasions ago. Maybe Reno. Maybe Wisford. The forces of karmic retribution would have decreed the same thing. He wasn't supposed to be here, living and breathing in this luxurious manor, and he sure as hell didn't deserve it. Yet fate had kept him alive for something bigger than himself. Bigger than the Senators and that shitty little club in that shitty little city. Maybe, if Elvia's words were to be believed, he could...

There it was.

It was all a process of elimination, really. He couldn't change his teammates. He couldn't change himself. So the only thing to change was the future, whatever was in front of him and whatever he could protect with his golden hands. Angelique hadn't shown the remorse he needed to see to believe that it was a one-time tragedy. He'd change that future, stand between murderous classmates and any asshole Regulars that were dumb enough to poke these rabid dogs. A screaming bitch was something he could handle. If the others on that truck were really so weak to resort to fatal methods against a powerless mob then he'd have no trouble stopping them either. Being a nuisance was what he was best at after all.

He wouldn't let these unstable pricks take another Regular soul, dickbaggery be damned. He wouldn't be able to take it otherwise.

It was an uncertain conviction. Unsteady, unfamiliar. But it was there and it was Earnest. That was everything he needed.

Ernie let out a small laugh, casual and light in contrast to the conclusion he'd branded onto his new self. There wasn't much he could say in return. "Fair enough. If it means getting to stay here some more then I'll do all the improving I can."

"Something to aim for, right? Better someone with actual powers than people like us, stuck between 'normal' and 'subnatural' but with barely enough of a gift to murder flies." She turned to check on the laundry, though the routine had embedded itself in her memory enough that she knew it would be long from done. Still, checking was an old habit of hers now in this place where they had nothing but time.

Actual powers. Ernie curled his hands. He'd already taken the first steps.

Footsteps, anxious and hasty, paced around the manor. The gallery had been fine, the greenhouse even better. But none of it really occupied him the way he wanted to be occupied.

The sight of a gleaming bench slowed him down, its marble surface framed by a boundless array of mixers and high-end liqueurs. No Owen. No Hazel either. Ernie stared for a moment. Something familiar, something to anchor him the only stable place he knew: the Alibi Ultra.

Like a man possessed he surged towards the mini-bar, quickly washing his hands before setting up. Minutes after that, a collection of brightly coloured cocktails lined the bar. He grasped a mint-green one in his hand and began drinking.

The hall was empty when Sander strolled down, hands still lightly shaky from the aftermath of a blood high. But there were no guards. No guns. No regular staffs with thinly veiled disgust when they regarded him.

Then he passed a maid with a white mark on her face, and he ended staring until she turned at the end of the corridor.

Where was he?

Sander blinked, unable to process. He needed to find someone to ask. He needed to…find Christmas.

Where was Christmas? He couldn’t find the scent, nor could he find anything that indicated the blond boy was here. Fear nagged at him with every step, and eventually, he just followed the closest familiar scent. Which led him to Ernie.

Alcohol in the blood heightened the scent, he observed.

“You’re…still here.” -Sander said, in lieu of a greeting.

Ernie chugged the rest of his Grasshopper before raising his eyebrow. So Sander thought he should be dead too, huh?

"Am I not supposed to be?" he chuckled, the sound insincere but not hostile.

“No…I just…” -Sander fumbled for a moment with his words, just as he pulled out a seat for himself –“You’re still at the bar. Just like back in USARILN.”

Oh? They were talking normally again? Ernie didn't know if he believed that follow-up or not. Sander still knew what Ernie really was so it probably didn't even matter what level of pleasantries were exchanged.

"It's where I work best," he shrugged, and began picking bottles from behind him, "Another Frostbite or do you want to try something new this time?"

Sander seemed slightly taken back by the offer, but he nodded, in the end -"Anything is fine."

The buzzcut Aberration nodded. Frostbite to start then. Ernie scanned the label of the Sierra Silver, eyes slightly widening at the "150-proof" before measuring it into the Boston shaker and handing the finished product to the vampire.

"There's a different sort of tequila in this one. Tell me how it is."

Sander knocked back the drink in one gulp, the stronger taste lingered on his tongue. It burnt on its way, but he supposed he liked it.

"It's good." - Sander gave a small smile, pushing the glass back toward Ernie.

A lime green champagne glass was waiting for Sander as he finished the Frostbite.

"Absinthe Hemingway. Like me," Ernie joked to himself. He looked at Sander as he sipped from a lighter cocktail, "We never really caught up after you took off with Hazel. How did things go with the crusher?"

Sander tensed, looking into the green of his glass. He remembered the fight. Of course he did, even when his recollection was marred by bloodlust.

"I...Maybe you should talk to someone else."

However, thinking about the battle sparked another one of his concerns.

"Have you...seen Christmas around?" -There was an edge in his voice, and as he spoke, Sander lifted his gaze to look at Ernie, blue eyes suddenly cold.

"I havent." Ernie answered firmly, betraying nothing as his light smile disappeared, "You should ask one of the guards."

He thought to the leaked video, of Christmas being used as a bloodbag. Finally fulfilling his purpose, albeit in a rather useless scenario. Disasters happened. Mending a handful of broken bones wasn't going to change much. Perhaps he was still there, back at D.C.

"Nice to know I'm the backup guy if you want company."

"You don't like me."

"Do you want me to?"

Ernie peered into his glass, finding no answers.

"I was fucking terrified of you," he admitted after a moment.

Sander was quiet for the longest time, swirling the liquid around in his glass.

"I suppose it doesn't matter what you do. I...won't kill you though, if that's what you're worried about."

Ernie nodded. "I know. I believe you this time."

He'd seen more than enough to support that.

"What stopped you from killing Hazel? Cal looked half dead because of her."

"Killing is bad." -The answer was short and curt, and Sander took to avoiding Ernie's gaze again.

"I guess I'll have to believe that too."

He pushed a brown-looking martini glass to his barmate and tried not to think about the evacuation team.

"Alexander. I tried googling once who it was named after but I couldn't find anything. Why should I talk to someone else about the battle?"

The name elicited old memories from Sander, who looked up from his drink like Ernie had just stabbed him in the stomach. He stared for a few seconds, wide-eyed and bizarrely sad, before letting out a choked breath and forcing himself to relax.

The drink also went down with a tilt of his head.

“Because I don’t like remembering.”

Same.

But the bartender merely responded with an apple martini. "What do you like then? Got any hobbies? Movies you like to watch?"

"I like Christmas. And drinks." -The blood mage sipped from his glass this time, savouring the sweet and tart apple flavour.

"Aren't they the sa--"

He stopped himself and the instinctual grimace he'd learned from the Senators.

"You didn't like anything before Christmas?"

"...I like drinks. Before."

"Before drinks then," Ernie sipped from his own. The buzz was starting to kick in.

"Bad stuffs." -There was a tension in Sander's shoulders that showed he was clearly uncomfortable. But he didn't stop. There was no reason to, really. Ernie was an Aberration, like him. No point in hiding what he already knew -"I'm allowed to...like."

The buzzcut boy sloshed together some higher-end vodka and triple sec, adding the rest of the ingredients as he replied, "Gonna have to be more pacifi--specific. Lots of stuff out there."

A Winter Chill slid towards Sander.

"I'm not allowed to anymore. Because of..." -Sander gestured at his mark, frowning into the drink like it offended him.

That wasn't a good one, huh? Another Frostbite for him then.

"You said you liked fighting. That you weren't supposed to. It was the first time we met at the bar. Is that it?"

"I used to. I'm trying to be better. Don't want to be a...monster."

A useless sentiment, Ernie thought.

"This whole class is full of monsters. You wouldn't be any different."

"Christmas is not a monster. Callan is not."

"They are not," Ernie agreed with the first statement at least, "But Angel is. Zoe too. People on the evac team. They murdered so many Regulars. Zoe almost killed her own teammates. Even if you're sometimes a giant asshole, I doubt you would have slaughtered a whole crowd of people. Those teammates are the monsters, right?"

Sander looked surprised at that, but a frown quickly creased his eyebrows -"Why would they...?"

Weren't they Aberrations? Was it the same for them too?

Another drink for both of them. Ernie couldn't remember what he was mixing anymore. It was fruity though.

"They only cared about themselves," he recalled Angel's words, "Didn't matter who got in the way. They needed to save themselves. Didn't care about those Regulars. It makes sense, I suppose. It's awful but I get it."

Because he would have done the same, right? He wouldn't have killed, he was sneakier than that. But he would have done a lot to get his teammates out of that situation.

Ernie's sombre words got to him, and Sander felt guilt sank to the pit of his stomach.

"...Have you killed...before?" -He asked suddenly, voice small.

The balded boy froze. He hadn't told anyone. He hadn't even lost sleep over it.

I never even saw his face.

But this was Sander he was talking to. He would understand, right? Would he even care? Would Ernie even care if he did? Thoughts meandered through a tipsy fog and Ernie decided he didn't feel like spending more brain energy on it.

"Once," he started carefully, "For Christmas, back in Wisford. A man was grabbing him, making him cry. I forgot to think about what I was doing."

Blood everywhere. How was he supposed to take his mind off that? Even now Ernie could feel the shivers returning. Everything else had been an afterthought. He hadn't lost any sleep.

For reasons he did not explore, Sander felt relief. Was it because Ernie was the one who did it? Instead of him? By doing that, Ernie had somehow helped to preserve the fraying fragments of his humanity? Sander did not know. Nor he wanted to. All he felt was relief. And gratitude.

“Thank you.” -But he couldn’t let Ernie do that forever. This was his burden and his responsibility. His purpose. Ernie might have hurt Christmas, but Sander wouldn't even wish the burden of taken lives on his worst enemies–“And…sorry.”

“I’ll do it next time.” -He said, steady like a promise. This guilt was his. What was another drop in an ocean of blood?

Ernie's glass stopped before they reached his lips. He didn't know what reaction he was expecting but it certainly wasn't that.

You wanted someone to condemn you.

He kept drinking, finishing it in one gulp before answering.

"I guess I'll be counting on you then."

Sander lifted his gaze and allowed himself a small smile. He knew how to do this, at least. This fire was good for something.

Ernie sat in a corner of the kitchen, muttering with a knife in his hand and a pile of mangled vegetables at his side. He knew that vegetable carving was a nightmarishly delicate art. He knew that his knife skills were rusty from disuse. And he knew that fucking Lisa by the sauces over there would eat her words once he carved that perfect rose. One watermelon peacock arrangment was all the damn maid needed to get a superiority complex. Urgh, he'd show her.

"That's a lot of veggies," Brent commented, walking into the kitchen with a spring in his step. He gave a friendly nod to Lisa as he passed by, before standing a few paces beside Ernie. "We're making vegetable donuts or something?"

"Don't insult me like that, dude. I don't want the vegans taking any more than they already have."

He stood up, cringing as carrot carvings fell from his aproned lap onto the floor. A glance up at his friend, then a frown as Ernie spotted purple marring the side of the Arbiter's face. He tapped his own jaw. "What happened there, man?"

Ernie thought for a moment. "Palm oil. We can try it with canola later."

"Aye aye, chef," Brent saluted, before heading off to grab the ingredients. He had already done previous research on where everything was, and with a little help from best maid Lisa, soon, everything was present on the table.

"Alright," Ernie dried his hands after an extended washing, "We going simple cinnamon first? Should we make a glaze to go with it?"

"Glaze sounds good," Brent replied, pulling out some extra goodies he brought along. "Was thinking of chocolate and sprinkles as well. You know how to jam jam in there?"

"Of course," the Aberration paused, "Are we making our own jam too?"

Brent grinned. "Is Lily worth it?"

She was there.

Ernie had thought about her involvement in the massacre. He'd tried to find something to condemn her just like the others. But he was missing details. All he knew was that she wasn't outside when it happened. Surely that was good enough?

The Aberration's easy-going smile shrunk a fraction before he shrugged. "It's been a while since I've made a decent jam. It'd be good to put it back into practice."

"Alright," the arbiter chimed, noting that slight pause before the answer, "Let's show off our housedad skills, eh?"

As the pair began mixing the dough (with occasional assistance from Lisa, much to Ernie's chagrin) the buzzcut boy wondered how to approach the questions on his mind. The direct approach hadn't gone well with Angel. Brent hadn't reacted much so Ernie didn't even know what he thought.

He...didn't know a lot of things about Brent.

But the amethyst-eyed Arbiter wasn't one of the problems here. One of the main ones anyway. Failing to find a way to be subtle about it, Ernie decided to just bite the bullet. "Did you manage to meet up with Siena?"

"Yeah," Brent replied readily, starting to crack the eggs, "The cars were lifted because she was trying to clear the road for everyone to leave more easily. But either the bricks or Angelic's scream caused her to lose it, so..."

The beating of the eggs slowed, as he processed the strange directions the conversation had gone.

"I think she can be trusted. Reserved, but...yeah, trustworthy."

"That's good."

It was, right? Siena didn't seem bad by any of Ernie's standards. He knew all about deceitful appearances but he just didn't sense that sort of thing from her. She was an Arbiter after all.

How many people were even under there?

He's protecting her, isn't he.

What? Nah, Brent was a cool dude. He was good friends with Siena, but he and Ernie were pretty tight too.

Please.

At least be subtle with it.

"Wait, she can 'lose it'?"

"Lose it as in lose focus, Ernie. Suppose concentration's important when you're juggling cars with your mind."

No, that wasn't wholly correct. There were other options to consider.

"Could also lose it if enough time passes, I think, or if her stamina was drained too quickly," he amended, "But those aren't likely, considering how she was part of evacuation efforts afterwards."

Brent mulled it over a little longer, before nodding.

"Far as she told me, Siena wasn't involved in whatever the hell happened, after those cars were dropped."

That didn't explain why there were people under there. Ernie guessed that all he could do was chalk it up to bad luck on Siena's part.

All he could do was not much at all.

"Was she cool with you asking? I know that it's something to be...hurt about."

"Cool?"

That smile was turning into something else, so he dropped it completely instead.

"I'd like to think that I'm still on good terms with her, at least. Didn't storm out like Angelic, after all."

A bitter chuckle left Ernie's lips at the mention of the rockstar. "That's good too. We could all use more friends."

He kneaded the dough absentmindedly, reflecting on the argument, on everything he'd concluded with himself afterwards.

"I really fucked up with her. I don't think I was wrong but I could've been better."

"Does it matter if you burn a bridge gently or violently?"

"I could've done it gently enough to at least leave a chance to repair it." Not that he was sure he even wanted to.

So that severance wasn't as final as he had initially thought.

"It's never really too late for that, Ernie," Brent concluded, "Just gotta put in that extra effort of rebuilding. Want me to start heating up the oil now? Or is it too soon for that?"

"I'm still fucking pissed," Ernie admitted with a laugh, "Don't know if it's even worth the effort. I'll keep it in mind though."

Never too late, huh? Knowing his past grudges he'd probably be dead before he ever buried the hatchet. Ernie was almost finished with moulding the dough.

"Oil sounds good."

"Aight," Brent nodded. "Hopefully nothing explodes, eh?"

A twist of a knob was all that was needed to get the induction stove to start working, deep, warm reds glowing on the black surface. With that quick task done, the arbiter went back to prepping for the ice cream segment of today's mission.

Ernie nodded, finishing with his dough. After a quick peek at the oil, he watched Brent with the ice cream. "You do a lot of cooking?"

"Didn't use to, but I got into the habit here," the arbiter replied, "Thought it'd be useful to pick up dorm-life related skills, even with a super-cafeteria just around the corner, yah know?"

"Oh, for sure. Alright, if you weren't a MasterChef before then what did you do instead?"

Brent looked at him weirdly. "Like, school? Didn't really have time for part-time and all."

"School takes up that much time? You an honor student or something?"

"Naw," the arbiter shook his head, "Just a normal student. Though my school's pretty high up there. What 'bout yours?"

Ernie laughed. He'd rehearsed this a few times in case anyone from the class ever brought it up. "Got homeschooled. Awakened some years before and, well, I was more useful in the kitchen anyway."

"Family friend. Parents passed away before I got the mark so they took me in."

Of course, he doubted that the Mahers ever had some personal connection to his family. The night and the house was probably just some stupid hit. Happened all the time to hapless rival factions.

"Makes two? What's that mean?"

"Oh, 'ena's also homeschooled," Brent replied, "Makes sense, I suppose, seeing how she didn't even know what junk food was."

"Damn. Homebody life, huh? I thought she'd at least do the Richie Rich thing and have a Mcdonald's installed in the mansion."

"Please, why have an entire restaurant built if you can just hire five star French chefs to cook junk for you? Anyone can own a restaurant, but owning talent? That's hard."

"Okay, that's a good point but like, she went how many years without junk food? Is the fancy stuff really worth it, bro?"

"I mean, didn't you watch Supersize Me?" Brent laughed, "Those years without junk food probably gave her a good twenty extra years on her lifespan. And cmon man, you forgot the hotel's buffet already? Let me remind you that gourmet burgers are also a thing."

Hands raised in surrender. "Alright, you got me there."

Ernie started on the jam, gathering strawberries and apples under Lisa's watchful eye.

"So you were pretty high end too, huh? Was your high school one of those fancy ones with uniform blazers and shit?"

"Your Sunday morning styles at school," Ernie joked, washing and chopping strawberries. Comfortable routine, "Did you ever get into that popularity drama stuff like in the movies? Parties and girls and prom?"

"You know it man," Brent replied, shaping up the dough into loops, "Though it was less being part of it and more watching it happen from a safe distance, yeah? Somehow ended up being the guy people went to vent relationship bullshit towards, even if I had nothing new to say on that subject."

"Everyone's best friend, huh?"

"More like Switzerland."

"What?"

Brent gave Ernie a blank stare. "Uh...geez, World War II? Switzerland? Or what about Swiss banks?"

Oh boy. Ernie cringed. Swiss banks like in all those spy movies? Offshore accounts? What did that have to do with school drama? "They only really taught the American Revolution in my semester at West. And Subnatural Studies but like," Switzerland? "...yeah, I don't get it."

"Oh, West must have shit education. Anyways, Switzerland was neutral in World War II. Famous for it even. And Swiss banks are known for their secrecy and all that. See how it lines up now?"

A moment of silence. "Ohhhhhh. Yeah, yeah, I get it now."

Man, he should have remembered that from Sound of Music. Or Great Escape. It was neutrality. Secrecy. Between his high school and Unit B, Brent hadn't really switched his alignments. Actors and observers, like Elvia had said. Seemed that the arbiter walked the line between both.

"You're pretty good at being Switzerland, I think," Ernie said with an earnest smile.

"Had to be, as secretary and all," Brent replied, finishing off the last of the dough. "Your show now, Ernie. How was the Western life?"

Strawberries and sugar went into a pot to simmer. "Gotta be more specific. USARILN, Reno, or my past life as Doc Holliday?"

"Let's go with Reno then. Got any spicy stories to swap?"

Spicy stories and anecdotes that were suitable to share with classmates were two categories with a very small overlap. Ernie had to think really hard about it.

"It's Reno so there's always some shady crap going on somewhere or other. The guy that took me in, he owned a bunch of businesses. Sometimes I'd fill in for them so I saw a lotta shit while working."

He talked about the period of time when Sia's Chandelier was all the rage, and all the light fixtures that needed replacing as a consequence. The crazy drunks, the ridiculous bar fights, the gut-turning, biological nightmares he'd find in the bathrooms. Isolated incidents that were vague yet crazy enough to pass the time.

"I can't actually remember if the goat ever found his way back," Ernie concluded as he finished up the jam, "But yeah, that's why eyelash curlers are the absolute worst."

"Dude," Brent laughed, "what the hell? I thought you were working in a restaurant, not a goddamn asylum. Sounds like a hell of a blast though. How many times did you get busted by the cops?"

"Craziest shit?" Brent didn't even need to think about it. "Oh, that's hella easy. So, buncha weeks ago I was basically just a normie, right? Doing that thing where you wake up in the morning and realize you got superpowers and all? Went through that whole thing where it's like 'oh shit, I got powers' to 'oh shit, Imma get shot if I don't fess up to the cops'. So I was just walking downtown to the neighborhood cop shop. Real nice summer day, yah? Birds chirping, blue sky skying, and there was this really nice fragrance in the air."

He paused then, for dramatic impact.

"And then wham! Everyone starts dying, yellow mist starts forming, and I managed to bail my own ass out with a cough mask while everyone else is writhing like mad. Super hardcore shit, man. I was basically probably going to die if it kept up any longer than it did." The arbiter nodded. "Yup, definitely craziest shit in recent memory. Can't think of anything to top it, really."

Ernie had been listening intently. Every good story had to have a build-up, right? The hand stirring the jam ceased as the story went on and he turned to the Arbiter. What the...Why was he so...

"Wait, you...that was...Perfume?"

"That's what the news people said," Brent shrugged, "Never got a glimpse myself. Probably temporarily blindness or something like that."

Exeter, New Hampshire. An alleged Cat's Cradle attack in recent times. Just another tragedy-stricken area washed away by dozens of other, more severe tragedies in the same month. Hell, the only reason Ernie remembered it at all was because the town's name sounded cool.

Of course he felt bad.

"Fuck...yeah, I don't doubt it," he frowned. The stove was turned off so the Aberration could pull his phone out and look it up. Sure enough, the New Hampshire town suffered major losses. Ernie noted the prep school in the area while Lisa started pouring the jam out for him, "Man, most of the town got w--" He needed a better word than 'wasted'. He couldn't find one.

"What about, like, your parents? Your friends?"

"Never checked."

"Huh?"

Huh? Huh?!

"You...couldn't?" Ernie tried to assume the best of his friend.

"Yeah, couldn't."

Brent didn't seem to be open to sharing details so Ernie assumed the best course of action was to just drop it. He chuckled instead, hoping to mask the discomfort he was feeling.

"Shit. And here I thought my stories were insane!"

"Yeah, sorry. Was that a bit too far?" Brent's gaze was apologetic. "The rest of my life's basically a slog. High school romance can only get so spicy, yah know?"

Why the fuck are you apologising?

"Yeah, I can imagine. Just a semester with the drunk, horny assholes at West was enough to make me want to shoot something. It's just..." Ernie had fallen apart when he lost his home. Brent lost his whole town and his freedom, "Man, you've got some crazy guts being able to talk about it."

"I...don't know about that."

Was it easier, because he had already spilled out much more with someone else?

"Well, would be better if no one else heard of it, you know? Really don't need anyone to pity me for it. There's probably worse stories out there." He paused. Remembered to think. "Guess I'll trust you with this, Ernie. Sorta nice to spill it out all at once."

A silence passed.

He trusted him. Ernie didn't realise how much he valued those words until they were said out loud. He didn't want to let go of this.

"No point in holding onto secrets, it'll come up eventually.”

Ernie turned to the Arbiter.

"Brent. You already know that I can be pretty shitty, right?"

"Yeah. And?"

Brent held his gaze.

Like it or not, Ernie trusted him too. The Aberration breathed deeply. These were the same kind of heartless people. Mages that stopped giving a damn about the world since they got their mark. But instead of an all-out physical attack, they rotted a city from the inside-out.

He wouldn't blame Brent if he hated him too.

All at once.

"After these donuts are done. After we both leave the kitchen and part ways. Get to a computer and google 'USARILN West Reno task force.' Just...don't do it in front of anyone, including me. You'll get a better story there."

The shooting range probably wouldn't do him much good. If Ernie missed one shot then there would be a dozen others in the magazine. And it wasn't like his power allowed for much long distance attacking. He doubted he'd ever need to snipe something when there were people like Brent and Gregory on the team.

Still, he couldn't help but linger in the hunting shed, fawning over the array of crossbows and rifles. This was some serious business stuff. Way fancier than the stuff Devon ever brought in. Ernie took a crossbow down from the wall, experimenting its weight between his hands and looking down the sights. Badass. But it didn't make the shooting range any less boring. This sort of equipment needed to be practiced with in situations that actually demanded it.

After looking around for anyone who saw him, Ernie trudged off into the woods. Perhaps it would be better to avoid the trail. Make sure no one distracted him if he was really going to sharpshoot with this thing.

All he had to do was plant his feet like so, pull this lever here, squeeze this--

The string snapped back into position with no warning, letting loose a bolt accompanied by a yelped "oh fuck!" from Ernie.

Meanwhile, Marcus was exploring the surrounding area of the Estate. He'd noticed much of the immediate area, the large quantities of ammenities tht everyone seemed to be enjoying, and the ever-present staff that showed up frequently enough to startle him literally every single time. They were always so apologetic about it too, which almost made it worse. After a point, it just seemed like they were doing it on purpose.

Now, he was exploring some of the other little trails. He'd heard mention of a shooting range off in the distance, and the prospects of bettering his ability with firearms was one that appealed to him. If they were going to be finding themselves in more combats with human or human-like targets, he could probably put his powers to better use offensively, rather than hiding in the evacuation team every time.

That, and Evac hadn't been going super well recently.

He'd just stopped for a quick rest on one of the nearby trees, stretching his leg for a moment. He'd been walking around too much lately; strolling through DC, leading the evacuation efforts, the walk to the estate and the numerous walks around the estate...the gentle throbbing reminded him of how infrequently he actually did any physical activity. Probably didn't help that he'd never completed the doctor's prescribed routine, but kidnapped subnaturals didn't exactly have a say in the matter. Fortunately, it was small, small enough for even the slightest amounts of adrenalin to make it fade away.

"Oh fuck!"

Marcus raised his head in surprise. He certainly hadn't expected anybody else to be out here at the shootin-

KA-THUNK

A yelp that Marcus didn't recognize as his own. Pain. Searing pain in his leg. Pain that started to dull away as his heart sped up and shock set in. There was something sticking out of his thigh, just above the knee. His pantleg was starting to turn red. It was all too warm. Rewind. Rewind

The sound of static faded, and the perfectly sawed-off end of a crossbow bolt fell to the ground, the brightly colored feathers fluttering slightly. Marcus let out a few deep breaths, his mind still in panic but his body having rewound to before that, creating an interesting contrast.

He bent down slowly, picking up the end and looking at it closely. He looked at his pants; no blood. He gingerly pressed his leg where he was sure it had been pierced; no hole. Of course. Rewind. Everything was fine.

Something glinted behind him as he stood up - embedded in the tree he'd been resting against. A bloody arrowhead, and nearly a centimeter of bolt-shaft.

As soon as that distant scream sounded, Ernie sprinted to the source. Oh shitshitshit, why was there someone here? God, the one time he wasn't lugging around his first aid kit. The one time he felt like acting like a trigger-happy redneck. Gah, those instruction manuals in the shed were there for a fucking reason!

Brightly coloured plastic feathers came into view and Ernie's gaze lifted up in horror to see that it was Marcus holding them.

Marcus got shot? Hah, ironic.

Ernie brushed that thought aside.

"What are you doing out here?!" he half-shrieked.

"Getting shot! Apparently!" Marcus half-yelled in response, the realization of the situation slowly coming to his mind as Ernie stepped into view. "I heard there was a shooting range somewhere out here! Figured maybe I could learn a thing or two, brush up on my firearm training while we have god-knows-how-long to ourselves!"

The words were bitterly sarcastic at this point, one of Marcus's alternatives to full-borne anger. It was hard to keep friends when losing your temper and shouting at people, and at least sarcasm offered a somewhat-calm neutral point.

Sometimes.

"What the hell are you doing out here, Trigger-Finger?"

An instinctual sneer worked its way onto Ernie's face as the nickname registered. "Shouldn't I be the one calling you tha--"

He stopped himself, amended his words and expression.

"Practicing, I guess," Ernie cringed at how stupid it sounded, "Shooting ranges are boring and there's a whole forest to use. Thought it'd be okay."

Fortunately, Marcus was too busy trying to pry the short length of an arrowhead out of the tree for the hurt to fully show across his face. He knew exactly what Ernie was referring to, and the best thing to do right now was to just pretend that he hadn't said it.

"Well, ya hit something!" Marcus said, prying the short stub out, miraculously avoiding cutting himself in exchange for a small splinter in his thumb. "I was excited, that's for damn sure! Try yelling 'fore' or something next time - maybe something like 'duck!'. Just so I'm not surprised at least."

"I'm a pretty bad shot at golf too so I guess that works," Ernie sighed apologetically, "That was really stupid of me. My bad. Do you need to go to the infirmary or anything?"

"Nope. I think I'm pretty good." Marcus said, giving his leg a quick test-bend, and rubbing the area where the phantom bolt still seemed to lay, an odd tingling sense with a slight amount of pressure.

"Plus I've still got one more of those, so you could do it again and I'd still be fine." he joked, twisting his leg around to look at the back of his pantleg as best he could. He paused, adding a hasty "Don't, though."

A cry of pain had pulled Brent out of his peaceful hike up the narrow trail, but as the arbiter rushed forward, a gun already drawn, what he was greeted with was two familiar faces instead. Ernie, carrying a fancy-smancy crossbow, and Marcus, looking at his pantleg. What was the story there?

Naw, first off, a greeting.

Pushing through the brush, the arbiter, dressed up in cargo pants and a windbreaker, waved at his two friends. He hitched up his backpack a bit, before saying, "Yo, guys, didn't know you were...hunting? out here. What was that yelp anyways? Sounded like a deer."

Not that he'd know.

Ernie's brow furrowed. "Deers yelp?"

"They don't?"

"I don't know about deer yelping, but I do. And I did. Ernie shot me. It was great." Marcus interjected, giving Brent a quick wave.

"Oh." He looked from Marcus to Ernie. Considering how hard Ernie had hammered Angelic over DC, it'd make sense if he'd do the same with Marcus. Still, Brent had to ask. "What's the story here? Warring over love?"

"I was just out here to make my way up to shooting range." Marcus said, putting his hands up in the classic 'I've done nothing wrong' position.

"But Brent makes a good point. Did you just want a reason to apologize to me, Erns?" Marcus added, turning to Ernie with a coy smile and fluttering his eyelashes a few times.

Ernie looked confused. "So you do want me to shoot you again?"

"Nono. I'm good. Once is plenty for me."

"Geez, I'd hope so. I'm not exactly looking to hunt human out here."

"Hunting, huh?" Brent grinned. "Gotta get only the freshest meat for dinner, Ernie?"

"Hey, I wasn't even proper 'hunting'. I just wanted to fiddle with some of the gadgets here," Ernie tried to justify himself but some of Brent's words caught his attention, "Wait, we're allowed to eat the animals here?"

"...wait, we aren't?"

"I don't see why we wouldn't be allowed to. It's the wild. Same as I expect we'd be allowed to fish if we so desired." Marcus interjected, giving his two cents on the matter.

"I wasn't planning on it, but I feel like I deserve some of the spoils if Ernie actually catches anything, so I guess I can tag along."

"It was one time!"

And so, after a quick return to the hunting shed and a friendly wave to the butler maintaining it, the three boys set off into the woods. The pleasant Fall morning shone filtered light through the trees, creating a peaceful ambience that only a place so untouched by humans could achieve. Light banter was traded between the friends, passing the time nicely. But as the minutes ticked into hours, Ernie started getting restless.

"Does hunting usually take this long?" he muttered.

"I think it usually depends on how quickly you find a deer. Or a deer finds you." Marcus muttered back, slightly softer. "I doubt the three of us crashing through the woods complaining about how long it's taking is going to help much, though."

"Just think of it like exercise," Brent chimed, not all that helpfully, "Or, I don't know, stick berries onto your clothes and hope it's a deer, not a bear, that goes after you."

A pause, and then the light of mischief.

"Or you could take a stick of deer pheromones and just rub it all over your body. That'd totes help."

"I mean, bear meat would be pretty good too," the Aberration reasoned, "I think I saw some fair-a-mones back in the shed. Do we need to go back and get them?"

"Listen, bear shows up: I am leaving. Immediately. And quickly. As for pheremones - I doubt it could hurt, just depends on if you want to smell like deer or not."

"Eww no, I just washed this yesterday. Brent? What say you?"

"I'm here to hike, Ernie," he replied, "You're the one that wanted deer meat, yeah? How about just rubbing it in your skull?"

His whining wouldn't go on long as something in the distance caught his eye. A large mound with a noticeable hollow in the base. Like a bear den.

Brent blinked.

"So," he said slowly, eyes darting from one detail to the other, "Quick review on bear countermeasures. If it's brown, lay down. If it's black, fight back. If it's wh-"

A low rumble echoed through the vicinity.

"Someone skipped lunch today?"

Marcus, having grown up in the suburbs, had very little ideas as to what bear dens looked like, and did not immediately distinguish the mound for what it was. To him, it was quite curious that Brent would bring it up again. Although there was one detail that caught his attention:

"Were you about to come up with a rhyme for 'white'? Isn't that just polar bears?" he said, chuckling slightly.

The rumble unnerved him a little bit, and he looked around anxiously. There wouldn't be a bear on an island, would there?

Ernie began backing away slowly, scraping his dirtied boot on the ground as he went.

"Uh, can bears swim?"

"There's spirit bears too," Brent said, wishing he had something better than a swiss army knife, "Albino bears and all. But yeah, those are...'If it's white, good night'. Comfy thoughts, you know?"

A small detail. A tuft of white on a branch.

"And yeah, Ernie, pretty sure they can. But really, what's there to be afraid of! We've faced off against bigger things, right?"

Well, no, other people did.

There was a lot of talk about bears going around, and it was starting to worry Marcus.

"Hopefully, we won't have to deal with anything as dumb as a polar bear on an island then. Or...any bear, for that matter." Marcus said, the chuckle that followed clearly more nervous.

The Aberration shuckled along. "I dunno, I hear boat-bears are a pretty common occurrence these...days..."

His voice petered off as a faint thump sounded nearby. Another thump. Another. Then a deep, guttural...squeal?

Ernie turned. A mound of white fur loomed from behind a log. Round, shivering. Though it lurked behind the shrubbery, Ernie could tell that its true mass easily dwarfed the three boys. Too bulbous to be an albino bear. Too meek to be a predator. And its ears were too...

They stuck out like two sore thumbs.

An eyebrow raised, Ernie clicked the safety off the crossbow. "That's not a bear, right?"

"That's..."

Wait, was that really it? Were they all mass hallucinating?

"...a giant rabbit."

Brent tilted his head to the side, before pulling out his phone. Oh, he's definitely going to take a picture of this!

"Wh-" Marcus started, daring to turn around and look at the same thing Ernie had turned towards.

He was dumbfounded. He was literally flabbergasted.

"Send that to me." Marcus said, leaning towards Brent but not taking his eyes off the monstrous rabbit in front of them.

The beast lingered in its spot as Brent adjusted his phone. Though shadow concealed the bulk of its body, a decently clear picture of the creature's silhouette could be taken.

Until the auto-flash went off.

A shriek boxed the ears of the three boys and powerful hindlegs launched the animal into the air, its trajectory set to land on Ernie. His rope was instinctively summoned but he found himself unable to move from the sheer surprise of the situation.

A shriek that seemed to resonate in his skull came out of this thing's mouth, forcing Marcus's ears to his head. He was still trying to figure out the logistics of the situation; was it a DC creature? Was this thing an experiment and they were being tested? Was it just and ungodly sized rabbit? All of these questions flashed through his head as the thing seemed to launch off like a rocket.

But what goes up must come down.

On Ernie, apparently. Who seemed to be frozen in sheer disbelief. Not that Marcus could blame him. Still, something had to be done before the kid wound up as a pancake, and the sound of static right beside Ernie would probably be second to Marcus shoulder-checking him as hard as he possibly could at full sprint.

The second sound of static indicated his rewind, putting him back a little bit further than he'd expected.

Right. He knew that. Four seconds.

He got a nice picture at least. All the way up until auto-flash made the big bunny become ballistic, a hell-screech from the spawn of Satan setting his nerves on the edge. With one powerful leap, it ascended, flying high enough to blot out the sun, and all Brent could do was gape as it fell with meteoric force, destination: Ernie.

Marcus moved before he could, a tackle and a rewind pushing both of them out of the way as two muscled hindlegs created large prints within the ground, the earth trembling at the descent of the king of rabbits.

The inadequate knife was in his hands once more, amethyst eyes lighting up.

"Marcus! Ernie!" This wasn't DC. This wasn't Wisford. But none of Unit B's powerhouses were here. "Are we doing this?!"

Ernie's durability prevented a rough landing from Marcus' tackle. Shame it couldn't prevent his stupid trigger finger from acting up again. A loaded bolt flew towards the rabbit's neck, zipping faster than his eyes could track before it bounced harmlessly off its hide. It didn't even react as if it had felt it.

Oh.

Oh no.

His rope would protect himself. It was the only thing it did. But what if Marcus ran out of rewinds? What if Brent's blade wasn't enough? The crossbow had certainly done nothing. He'd trusted the others in his class to take care of themselves. D.C. had shown him why he shouldn't have.

Three minutes of vulnerability if he failed. But that wasn't going to happen. He wasn't going to fail again. There was only one enemy.

Take action.

As the rabbit scratched at the dirt where Ernie was supposed to be, the Aberration crept forward. He hadn't used this in a while. Launching into a low sprint, Ernie tapped the ground by the rabbit's feet, lighting up a circular rune and trapping it to that spot. Then he backed away, answering Brent's question with a "nope, no we're not."

"Works for me! Marcus said. Ernie's bolt had bounced relatively harmlessly off the rabbit's throat, tumbling into the foliage near Marcus, who took the opportunity to grab it while the rabbit had been distracted. At least he had something somewhat sharp now.

If he'd known about this, maybe he would have brought a gun.

The first was an explosion of light, the blade of the knife extending into the length of a machete.

The second was a hot wind, the material composition of the blade changing, becoming more suitable for cutting through fur, fat and flesh in a single stroke.

WIth the vorpal blade in hand, and Ernie's suggestion of retreating, Brent nodded once.

"How long do we have?" the arbiter asked, backstepping away.

"Five minutes," Ernie replied, thankful that the cooldown for his rope had lessened since the dream, "I gotta stay in range for it to keep working but..."

He studied the creature as it shrieked some more. It shrieked a lot, actually. Was that just how it normally sounded?

The rabbit scratched at the ground some more, turning inquisitively towards the boys. Its hindlegs twitched but didn't leave the ground.

"I won't get hurt if it pounces again. You guys can leave early if you want."

"I mean. I'm all for leaving, if I'm being perfectly honest." Marcus said, spinning the crossbow bolt in his hand to wield like an awkwardly-sized knife.

"But if the thing's trapped, we might as well throw what we've got at it - just so we know it's not gonna sneak up on anybody else around here. I can give us two minutes if we need - no range requirements."

"Yeah, and I'm fairly certain I could just cut it in half," Brent added, the blue hue of his impromptu sword pulsating within the shadows of the canopy, "But...like..."

It WAS cute. Almost too cute to bisect into gory bits.

The Aberration frowned. Its infernal squeals had shrunk into more tolerable levels as it rested in its spot. It wasn't even looking directly at the subnaturals anymore. Big ol' eyes blinked and its rabbit nose twitched and Ernie felt a pang of something that made him cringe at the sight of Brent's knife.

"Yeeaahhh, maybe we should just... I mean, two minutes is a long enough time for running."

He couldn't eat that much rabbit meat anyway.

Marcus looked back and forth between the two, before a lightbulb went off in his head. "Oh. Ooooooh. Alright. Sure." he said, an insufferable look of smugness on his face as he glanced between the two other lads of the group. "I get it. Sure, let's get out of here."

A quick dash for him to grab the thing's big ol' cotton tail, and it was left flickering. Artifacting in and out just like Lawrence and Siena had, only on a much bigger scale.

And while he was there he gave one of the giant rabbit's foot a quick rub, for good luck and all that.

"Make sure that picture came out well enough." Marcus said to Brent, nonchalantly walking away from the frozen bunny.

They made their way back to the hunting shed, where a butler offered to return their hunting equipment for the group.

"Uneventful trip?"

Ernie merely let out a curt "hah!" at that.

"Jeeze man. Marcus said, with a faux offended voice. "So we come back empty handed. It's hard for three people to hunt effectively. Takes a lot of co-hop-eration." he added, giving a glance to his two friends.

"Least it wasn't stressful," Brent said, winking at the others, "No need to lose any hare over it."

Ernie took a moment to think one up. "I wonder why it was so big. We probably wouldn't've been able to g-rabbit even if we wanted to."

At the mention of 'big', the crossbow clattered to the ground. The butler muttered a quick apology and returned to its maintenance.

Marcus jumped in surprise as the crossbow hit the ground, reflexively putting his hands over his head to guard himself. He gave a curious look to the other two, before looking back at the butler as he put things away.

"Butterfingers," the servant chuckled coolly, though his smile seemed strained, "Haven't had my break in a while."

"Ooh," Brent winced, "Probably should take that break. Gotta ask though, you know of any animal here that shrieks really loudly?"

"Well, the deers can get pretty agitated, depending on the season."

"How about the rabbits?" Marcus asked, following Brent's lead. "I hear they can be a giant nuisance."

The butler hesitated. "The rabbit population here does get quite...large if we don't take steps to control it. I'm afraid I can't tell you much about them shrieking though. Perhaps you misheard something out there?"

"Mm, hopefully. Did catch a glimpse of something big and white in that direction, but, well..."

"Huh?!" his head snapped to Brent before he composed himself, "I mean...you saw..."

The butler looked as if he was holding something back. He shook his head.

"Never mind."

"Yeah. We saw." Marcus said, looking the butler plain in the eyes.

The servant deflated and sighed. "It's been a while since such a large group has stayed here. She usually doesn't go out of her way to play like that. I'd appreciate it if you could keep this on the down-low?"

"Oh."

Brent recalled the knife.

"OH."

Shit, was that thing a pet?

"Could you tell us what she is then?"

A scratch of the head. "A rabbit. I can't recall her breed though."

"Okay. Yes. A rabbit. A huge rabbit." Marcus said, stretching his arms out for emphasis. "Like, did it just get that big naturally? Or is it someone's pet? Or is it one of the staff around here? I have a lot of questions regarding this."

The butler cringed. "She belonged to one of the kids from the earlier group, the one with Mr Alkana and his team. Marsha's size is most likely due to the child's intervention. They haven't returned to the estate in a long time and I wasn't sure what to do with her."

He sighed again.

"It's a poorly kept secret. She usually stays out of trouble, I swear. Keeps pests away from the greenhouse. I thought it'd be enough to manage her with my own powers but evidently I need to take greater cautions when visitors arrive. My apologies for the trouble." He said with a bow.

"Oh no," Brent shook his head, "No need for that. She's really cute. Pretty sure all the girls in class would love to play with her."

"Mmhmm, super cute," Ernie affirmed. He still wasn't sure how sensible the idea of letting a giant bunny freely wreak havoc in the deep forest was but the fact that Marsha wasn't a savage, murderous beast brought him some solace.

Savage and murderous...

Oh dear.

"The only trouble here is our classmates," Ernie warned him seriously, "There are a lot of Aberrations. I can't say they'll definitely go into the woods but..."

The butler nodded. "I'll take that into account. I've been meaning to get her into an enclosure but, well, there are some obvious complications with that. I'm sure if I enlist the help of some of the other staff then it will be fine. Thank you."

"Good call, Ernie," Brent thumbed up the considerate Aberration, "And if you need any extra help, I'm willing to offer it. Would be a shame if she got caught in the crossfire."

Even if her 'owner' must have already passed away.

"Yeah, I can try and help too, but I don't really know how much I can offer." Marcus added, looking at the butler. "But definitely pen her up somewhere, at least until our group leaves. Bad eggs and all that."

Ernie nodded. He considered offering his unbreakable lasso but considering the amount of giant rabbit poop he'd stepped in today...

By the time pleasantries had been thoroughly exchanged with the animal-handling butler it was almost time for lunch. Brent had gotten distracted by something in the shed and waved them goodbye about a minute ago. The other two began their trek back to the manor in the meanwhile.

Strategically, it wasn't, as long as Ernie knew how to use it. Quiet, reusable, and who knew what kind of fancy things he could do with his lasso and a crossbow bolt. The only real downside it had was weight and aim - otherwise it was just like another gun for the rapidly growing arsenal of weapons they were being provided for missions.

Two misfires in a day and it wasn't bad to have? The Aberration looked at him skeptically. "For real? What do you mean?"

"I dunno." Marcus shrugged, suddenly being forced to rewind his brain back to the point he'd just made to himself. "It's basically just like a silenced gun, except it's a little heavier, and you can pull the ammo out of someone and shoot someone else with it. Plus, I've literally got no idea how your bungee works, so maybe you could use it as an anchor point? Makeshift grappling hook or something?" he suggested, waving his arms wildly in a generally accepted 'I have no idea what I'm talking about' fashion.

"Well, recycling's never a bad thing," Ernie humored the idea of multi-use ammo, "I'll give that grappling idea a test run later then."

The ideas were abstract but Ernie could already see more paths opening for him. He'd need a longer rope though. He grinned in excitement.

"Yeah, that's some decent stuff. But being the face and brains of the operation? Leave some room for the rest of us, Time Scar."

"Hey, this is exactly the kind of glory-hogging that leads to boy bands breaking up."

"Alright fine. Maybe I can make an exception for the boy band. Since we're such charming individuals and all - ready to take America's heart by storm and blah buh blah buh blah..." Marcus chuckled, trailing off into gibberish.

Ernie merely shook his head in faux disbelief. Talking came so easily when it came to Marcus. It almost helped him forget D.C. But not quite.

"Yeah, TMZ's gonna eat that shit up," he smiled contemplatively, "Brent's already got this Red Ranger reputation cos of all the directions he gave in his clip. But you dived into a freaking collapsed building. Both of you better work hard if you wanna top this month's popularity poll."

"'Dived' is a strong word." Marcus said, giving an unsure shrug. "'Snuck in like a suicidal idiot' is probably more along the lines of what I would use. But hell, I'll take the popularity votes where I can get 'em. All I have to do now is come up with a catchphrase involving 'Zip Zip Boi' and Brent won't even stand a chance." he said, a genuine chuckle punctuating his sentance.

"Making the most of all your public personas, huh? Smart."

The manor was quickly approaching and with every step Ernie could feel his spirits sink to the level it had been before the hunting trip. He couldn't go on like this, without knowing if his friends were people he could trust. There probably wasn't a good way to approach this anyway. Worse methods, like what he'd done with Angel, but nothing that would preserve the fractured remains he already had. Time to just bite the bullet.

"Actually, now that we're talking about D.C...."

Do it.

"I...saw the man on Pennsylvania Avenue. The big guy with a hole in his head."

Marcus's mood shift was visible. The joy drained from his face almost immediately, the laughter in his eyes replaced first with a sligh confusion, before it switched over to a hurt betrayal, and finally guilt, which pointed them directly away from Ernie's gaze.

His fault. His decision. He'd taken a life this time, not just stood by doing nothing while someone died. He'd just been an unwitting bystander in those, despite the fact that he could have saved them. It wasn't his fault that they were dead...or at least that's what he continued to tell himself, despite what he knew was true.

This one had been him though. He'd actively killed a man, and apparently Ernie knew. His hair bristled with paranoia. It always seemed like these kind of conversations were too open ended. Nobody ever wanted to come out and say it. Not Ernie. Not Brent.

Denial had done nothing for him back when Brent had done this. All that had gotten him was a knowing look and a lasting fear of retribution. No point lying again; not to Ernie, when he obviously already knew.

"And?" Marcus said, the tone of his voice almost angry as he seemed to challenge Ernie's statement. Too defensive with Brent. That had been a failure. Perhaps an offensive stance was the way to go.

Ernie flinched at Marcus' sudden aggression. He wasn't sure how this conversation would go but he wasn't expecting this.

Is he even sorry?

The Aberration bristled visibly in return. "How many times did you even fire before you decided to just end it?"

"Zero." Marcus said, the same challenging tone in his voice.

Hurt crossed Ernie's face. No, no, it wasn't supposed to go like this at all.

"You didn't even try...didn't even consider a non-lethal option?"

"Emma asked him nicely to stop, and he continued killing her. I asked him less nicely to stop, and he continued killing her." Marcus said, lifting up and counting off fingers as he spoke. "I tried to force him off her, and he turned around and nearly punched my teeth out of my skull. Diplomacy wasn't stopping anything, Ernie. Force did." Marcus said, glaring once at Ernie before his eyes darted off to the ground again.

He wasn't proud of his actions, but he wasn't going to apologize for them.

"Two subnaturals couldn't do shit against one Regular so in the end it took a fucking gun to fix things," Ernie shoved his fists into his pockets to stop them from shaking, "A bullet to the guts or the leg wasn't gonna satisfy you, huh?"

"Emma wasn't doing a damn thing to protect herself. One subnatural was getting herself killed and another was trying to help. And I wasn't exactly in the mood for hesitation: for lining up a shot to his knees while he punched me in the face again." Marcus said, vaguely aware of the fact that his voice was raising slightly, and he was saying things that he probably shouldn't have.

He took a deep breath before he continued, slightly quieter, and significantly more tired. "What do you want from me? An apology? 'Sorry I panicked and had to resort to violence when a lynch mob was forming around a bunch of scared evacuees'?"

He sounded just like Angel. Ernie could feel the derision and hatred already well up in him. The mention of Emma twitched a deeper frown out of him but he put it at the back of his mind for another day.

"I dunno," he snapped, "I thought you were the kind of guy that could think through his anger. Make decisions when panic is ruining everything for everyone."

God, Ernie felt stupid now. So it had been half-spite, half-irrationality. Better than Angelique's ratio, if that was anything.

"I...thought you'd be better than me at least."

A moment of silence as Marcus's eyes searched the ground. "Yeah. I thought I'd be that kind of guy too. But I'm not. That much has been proven over and over again. Wisford. DC. I...I couldn't...I can't." Marcus said, his tone dropping from weariness to outright defeat.

"That much I'm sorry for. For not being the person we thought I could be."

"Whatever. Just don't let the papers find that out." Ernie rolled his eyes but it felt like an icy fist was clenching around his heart.

Wisford. All the time, that fucking town wouldn't leave him. Ernie recalled David's scarred face, wondered if the Arbiter could ever see or even speak again after what Ernie had put him through.

The rogue mages. Were they following the APC or had Ernie missed something in David's pockets?

"Look, D.C. was fucked for you, I know. But those rogue mages weren't because you panicked," Ernie tried reassuring him weakly. Did he deserve to know?

Marcus's eyes darted to Ernie's. A brief flash of guilt and realization all at the same time. He didn't know. He didn't know the things that Brent knew. Ernie didn't even know that Marcus had been the one to get Savannah killed. He was safe.

Still he said nothing, his eyes searching once around Ernie's for that sudden epiphany, and then darting away again, like a frightened animal.

Of course the Aberration caught that look. Ernie might've been naive and unacademic but he wasn't a complete fucking idiot. His brows furrowed, mind racing through his internal databank for what could have possible caused it but found nothing. So he dropped it. David's story would be untold yet another day.

"It's just...so easy to hurt someone when you want it, yeah? A gunshot. A hasty sentence," he sighed instead, "I dunno. If I've learnt anything these past weeks, it's that 'easy' almost never means 'right'."

Safety. Topic shift. He was in the clear.

Marcus sighed too, almost as if he were trying to side with Ernie in this debate of theirs. "Yeah. But sometimes you hurt people without meaning to...and 'hard' doesn't always mean 'effective'. Or at least, that's what I've learned over these last few weeks."

He could've gone on the offensive again. It would have been easy. Bring up Christmas again, ask him how easy it was to hurt him. But he didn't. Even if Ernie wasn't happy with him, they were just two kids fighting the same war. No reason to burn bridges.

The buzzcut boy nodded silently. There weren't any right answers in sight. Maybe he wasn't smart enough to find them or maybe...

Maybe there just weren't any.

"At least Emma made it out safely," Ernie commented before recalling the video of her getting tossed sideways onto the rubble. Huh. She wasn't doing much there either. Past conversations of shutdowns and uselessness resurfaced and Ernie found himself frowning in confusion, "What did you mean she wasn't doing a damn thing?"

"I...I don't-" Marcus started, rubbing the back of his head nervously. He really shouldn't have said that, and he definitely shouldn't have even considered talking about it more. But it was frustrating, and maybe venting a little bit wouldn't be such an awful thing.

"I don't know. he continued with a large sigh and lost shrug. "I don't know if she was just stunned or what. She got tackled, and the guy just kept punching her over and over, and she didn't even have her hands up to protect herself...I think she was caught off guard, but..."

There was that little hint of doubt, and after everything Emma had told him last time they talked...maybe she didn't want to defend herself.

"I mean, even if she's caught off guard isn't that what the tulpas are there for? Det made for a pretty cool guard buddy last night," the Aberration said absently as he tried to pull up more memories.

"So, go ahead and hate me. You have every right to. Hell, go ahead and tell the others what a piece of shit I am. It’s not like I deserve their friendship. When it comes time, I’ll be the one dying, not you, Ernie. Because really, I’m the useless one, even with this power. I’m not reliable, and I’m not strong. So… whatever you think of me is probably right.”

Yikes.

Ernie pursed his lips. "Shutdowns happen a lot in our line of work. They shouldn't, but they do. ...I dunno. I get the feeling she doesn't like herself that much. That, uh, probably doesn't have much to do with panic shutdowns. Sorry."

"Christ man. Nobody here like themselves. It's like a self-confidence disease comes with this damned mark, I swear." Marcus said, tapping his white streak for emphasis.

"And I don't know what the tulpas do, besides stand around and shout existential horrors from the corner."

Ernie barked out a harsh laugh. "You'd be surprised at the egos of some of the guys I've met."

"Not at, from. Last time I saw him he was desperately pleading for Emma to, and I quote, 'Not let him die'. It's the stuff of nightmares. And I'm too afraid to ask about the other ones."

"...He...did seem rather caught up with his own existence...?" Ernie tried to ignore the last statement, "Anyway, this seems like the sorta shit that needs to be brought up with her. Maybe if she can actually do stuff, defend herself with what she's got, no one'll need to get shot next time."

Marcus gave Ernie a dirty look, continuing on without saying anything about that little statement. "Maybe. But like I said...I don't know if she was just taken by surprise or what. Hopefully she feels a little bit better in the next week if not."

"Hell, you could even have some kinda training sesh," Ernie grimaced inwardly at what he said earlier, "I know Rosa would probs get cranky if we weren't keeping up with training. Might as well take advantage of the time and space we've got here."

"I don't know. Maybe a few weeks without training would be a good thing? It's not like our powers degrade if we don't keep using them." Marcus said, rubbing the back of his neck again. "Every chance we get to relax and just be normal kids, I think we should take. I doubt we're gonna get away with this many days of not training when we get back, so might as well enjoy ourselves, you know?"

"Normal kids, huh..."

Not now. Not in front of Marcus. Ernie shook the melancholic shift out of his system with a roll of the shoulders.

"Yeah, fair point. Not everyday you get free access to a minibar and supercar. But you know what they say: failing to prepare is preparing to fail. I just want things to go less...shit next time, I guess."

"Yeah. Me too." Marcus said with an irritated chuckle.

"Me too..."

The pair climbed the steps of the manor together, finally returning to the homestead after the forest trek. The conversation had reached an end but Ernie clearly still had much on his mind.

So the Aberration stopped. Turned to Marcus with an unfamiliar conviction in his gaze.

He was going to be losing friends left and right if this continued. He was going to be in harm's way if he tried to stop them. But seeing this destruction, all this unnecessary death and suffering go on would eventually break him harder than any fractured bone would. Observing had done nothing. Maybe he wasn't smart enough to find the right way of doing things. He'd done too much to ever be the authority on that. But he knew what was was 'wrong', where it was coming from and who was going to stop it.

He would become an actor, like Elvia said. Stop the bullet from leaving the barrel. He would do it with his bare hands if it was needed. No, not bare. With a pistol and a golden rope. That would be all he needed.

"If...if something like D.C. happens again, but in front of me..."

It wasn't a threat. Hell, there wasn't even any hostility in his words. It was just a promise of action. Ernie spoke firmly.

"I'm gonna do everything in my power to stop it. If it's you or Angel or anyone else in this class, if I have the chance to prevent something so needlessly hurtful from happening again then I will take it."

Hazel eyes searched chestnut for a response.

Chestnut eyes searched hazel, looking for intention. Not a threat, but a warning. A difference in operation.

"That's fine Ernie, as long as you know where your prorities lay. I'm not going to let the people on my team die just because there might have been a better way to solve things. If I have to take action, I will." The statement was equal in Marcus's attempt to prevent hostility from sneaking through.

A silence before Ernie finally smirked. There was a note of relief through it all.

"No hard feelings then? Not until the time comes?"

"None. Marcus said, giving Ernie a slight nod. There was a moment of silence as he thought of something, before he turned to look incredulously at Ernie, a smug look on his face. "Hey wait. Is that why you shot me in the leg?" Marcus asked, the look on his face indicating he was just messing with Ernie.

The Aberration's face curled in embarrassment before he pouted and muttered, "Maybe I should go back and get it after all."

Marcus laughed, giving Ernie a playful nudge. "I'll be long gone and hiding in the rafters before you get back. Really no point to it."

So handy, with internal blendy bits and everything! Ernie happily shook his frozen daiquiri as he wandered down the hall, marvelling at the complete lack of spillage. Another day, another discovery. The world worked in wondrous ways and every breath was a gift. How lovely.

The Aberration pinballed off the walls of the manor, tripping over himself only a grand total of three times, before he reached the garage. A really nice place too. Down the stairs, into the pretty black car. Ernie toppled inwards, only his top half needed to find what he needed. Cup holders. This shit could hold like one...two...so many daiquiris, man. Smoothie bottles so convenient.

He kicked his legs in the air outside the car in delight.

Most nights, Siena was already in her room, her phone in hand, and testing the waters with a multitude of names--but most nights was most nights and not nights after she had started trying to figure out the art of driving. There wouldn't be many opportunities back at USARILN, as far as the girl knew, but a faint sense of pride kept the girl from trying during the day. Too many embarrassing ways to die, she supposed, if she drove the car into a tree or off the edge of a cliff.

The mental image of the latter did not make the Arbiter believe that she should be more willing to drive at night, but if there was anything she wanted to do less than dying in an embarrassing manner, it was going back to her room to try and pull sources. That said, Siena made her way toward the garage with every intention o--

Those are legs, sticking out of the car.

'Yes, those are legs sticking out of the car.'

Should she have been that calm?

"U-um...hell...o...?"

A thud on the doorframe as Ernie hastily shot upright. Hazel eyes took awhile to blink themselves out of the daze before they adjusted on the brunette.

"Car...Siena..." he muttered before realisation took his expression, "It rhymes!"

'That doesn't rhyme at all?' Maybe it was a joke? Instead of voicing her confusion, Siena gave a laugh. Sort of. It was more of a confused titter than an actual laugh. Well, she tried. It was the thought that counted, right?

"Speaking of cars, um..." What were you doing? That seemed like a good question to-- "Going for a midnight drive?" ...ask.

The Aberration looked contemplative. "Are you?"

"I um..." Giving a sheepish, nervous expression, Siena scratched the back of her head. "I just started learning how to drive, so I thought it would be less embarrassing if everyone was asleep." Infinitely less embarrassing. "S-so if you were planning on a drive, I can come back tomorrow."

"Hmmmmm," Ernie stretched over the roof, "So you don't have a proper permit?"

Oh, right, that was a thing.

"Um...n-no...?" It wasn't as if she could pull a permit from thin air, nor did she know exactly what a permit looked like, so lying about it wasn't the best course of action. Was it that bad when they were on private property? Probably.'Shut up, logic.'

The boy clambered over into the passenger's seat, legs flailing for a bit before his seatbelt clicked and his bottle was deposited into the beloved cup holder with a dramatic swig.

"Safety first!" he called out and pointed to the rack of bike helmets, "Get one for both of us."

Alright, well, there were probably better ways to try and come up with a reason as to why it would be fine for her to drive. Maybe she could just come when there were--wait, did she hear that right? Surprise hit her like a bag of bricks as Ernie made his way into the passenger's seat, then came back for a second round with her face when he pointed at the bike helmets. That...didn't seem quite right either.

But uh...well, if Ernie was humoring her, she supposed she should have as well...?

"Um...have a color preference?" She questioned, masking the uncertainty in her voice, but failing to succeed in preventing her steps from being uncertain.

The Aberration considered it like it was the meaning of life itself. "Red is a fast color."

"Like a race car red, right?" Other shades of red didn't exactly feel "fast" as Ernie had put it, after all. Picking up the most vibrantly red helmet and one in what she assumed was something between black or navy. Taking a few steps toward the car to ensure she wouldn't miss, Siena tossed the helmet in a gentle arc toward the other mage despite the immense confusion that continued to overtake her. "Will these really help?"

"Do you want your head to explode?" Ernie scowled but looked at the shade of red approvingly as he caught the helmet.

Explode?! That didn't sound quite right either, but some part of the girl wanted to see where things would go if she played along. A faint, burning curiosity that said "it'll be more interesting than a foregone conclusion" instead of "get him out of the car, he's clearly not thinking straight." So Siena went ahead and rolled with the punches.

"N-No..." The girl claimed while moving for the car, her fingers blindly fiddling with the straps to adjust them before reaching for the door handle. She wondered, briefly, if this was the type of car that he would have driven. "Any other tips you have to share?"

"Gradual pressure on the pedals, use the high beam lights since this island is pretty open," Ernie advised sagely, "And make sure the garage door is open before we drive out."

"All excellent pieces of advice!" The second one, Siena doubted she would have thought of without being told. Daytime didn't generally warrant the use of bright lights, she supposed. Settling into the driver's side, the girl glanced at the helmet in her hands. Rolling with the punches. Right. She clipped it on over her head--she wondered, briefly, if it really would do anything to stop a head from exploding in any situation where it might happen--before turning to face Ernie. Right, she had...some sort of capability with a car, didn't she? "W-well, here goes nothing."

Here goes nothing? Is this really a good idea? No. Probably not.

Ernie observed Siena's technique as she traversed the roads around the manor. Hesitant at first but grasped the concepts well. He gave her tips on her cornering, reminded her to indicate and switch gears. An occasional scrape happened here and there, nothing major. The Arbiter learned well.

Which made for an increasingly boring drive.

Ernie tapped the upturned bottom of his bottle, dismayed as the final drops fell onto the side of his face instead of his mouth. With a sigh, he turned back to the lesson at hand.

"Nice job, Siena. You have good foundations," he repeated what she'd said to him in the music room. Hopefully it sounded smart, "Do you have anything new you want to learn tonight?"

So far so good, though Siena was admittedly hesitant and clumsy with the controls--do you think he would be proud of you?--when it came to knowing where and when to shift, but it was becoming more natural the longer she remained on the road...well, at least that was what she would like to believe. Part of her wasn't entirely convinced, but she hadn't run the car hood first into anything, so that was a bonus. As Ernie spoke, Siena dared a glance toward him before quickly returning her eyes to the road. Anything new? There was more to driving?

"New...?" Her voice echoed her thoughts, a trace of confusion. It didn't seem like an attempt at humor, but she had never really thought much about driving before. Nothing beyond the idea of "get on the road and don't crash" had ever been entirely relevant. Not wanting to sound entirely oblivious, Siena tried to mask her obvious uncertainty with humor. "You mean like getaway driver techniques?"

Whew. That hadn't been what he meant at all but now that she mentioned it...

Ernie's eyes lit up. "You know them?"

He seemed oddly excited about the prospect of doing daredevil stunts in a car that might get one or both of them killed. Siena blinked in surprise a few times and slowed the car down. Well, if she thought about it...well, there were ways around not knowing herself, weren't there?

"Well, I don't, but I'm sure someone in a book does..."

"Nah, nah, nah. No book needed, I'll be the book. First we gotta find a good road to practice on."

The road he selected was a little runway surrounded by untamed greenery, just a minute or so out of town. Probably best if they didn't disturb the townsfolk too much. Ernie stretched and adjusted his helmet straps as he talked.

"A'iiight. Now, show me how you'd normally do a U-turn."

"Um, oookay...?" It didn't seem like there was much chance of running into anything bar for stray wildlife, so a U-turn was feasible. Just...all the way around, pretend there's a divider or something...? Siena did as instructed, a normal, safe U-turn.

The Aberration nodded like a sage kung-fu master. Just like in all the movies.

"Okay, I want you to gain some speed as we go down this road. Forty-five should do it. When I say 'go', I need you to yank the wheel to the direction of the other lane and keep it there until I tell you to stop."

He grinned as if he was merely teaching someone how to use fabric softener. His hand now rested on the gear shift, ready to jump to the handbrake if needed.

"Got it?"

He wanted her to what?

"Um...I think so?" The road was empty, as one might expect in an area as remote as their current location, but that didn't sound like the safest of maneuvers. Then again...maybe that was why Ernie had wanted the helmets? And exactly why did Ernie know getaway driver techniques? The latter question was muted as Siena started speeding the car up, accellerating faster than before with the comfort of a road before them.

The numbers ticked up. 25. 35. 45--there it was. She yanked the wheel toward the other lane, the tires released a sound on the earth that sounded almost like nails on a chalkboard, and she felt the car turn. Her breath caught in her throat and her heart started racing wildly...but it wasn't entirely unpleasant. A quick jolt of adrenaline that evoked emotions of...joy? She couldn't stop the faint smile from cracking on her face as the car swung with force, eyes wide with a mixture of what was probably terror, excitement, and some muted form of elation.

"Wh-whoa!"

"Gaagh!"

The familiar sound of squealing tires. The sensation of inertia lightly ripping his head from its prior position. Ernie let out an awestruck woop as he moved the handbrake and gear shift accordingly. Man, he'd missed this.

As the car finally settled once more, he shot a glance out the window. Overturned by about a third of a rotation, not to mention they were halfway on the grass now. Still...

"That was fucking awesome!" he gave the girl a congratulatory slap on the shoulder, "Not bad for a first-timer. How'd ya like it?"

Her heart was still racing, eyes a fraction wider, the faint upturn at the corner of her lips a dead giveaway to the emotion that tried to nudge its way to the front lines as the girl glanced at her temporary instructor. More thrilling than it would have been a month ago. The small voice was right. With everything that had happened, a quick swinging car didn't seem like more than a moment of cheap excitement.

She let the grin on her face grow a bit more, heard the laugh in her voice more than usual.

"Oh my god, Gerwulf would have killed me for that." A cheeky, mischievous smile. "Can we do it again?"

The grin on Ernie's face was positively maniacal. He didn't know who this Gerwulf fellow was, but if it meant sticking it to the man then he was more than happy with it.

"Practice makes perfect!" he was showing all his teeth now, "I'll let you do the handbrake this time."

Somehow, she didn't feel like she should have been as elated as she was, but the grin on Ernie's face combined with her own newfound comfort seemed to amplify the emotion, seemed to make her smile grow with each thundering heartbeat. This was an entirely different type of freedom compared to what she'd had earlier.

"Alright." Eagerness built up pressure, waiting to break free. It didn't feel unpleasant. "You should show me some other moves later. As done by the master, right?"

Ernie laughed goodnaturedly. "Easy, Grasshopper. Gotta get the basics down before we flip anything too fancy."

Master, though? He wasn't sure about that.

"No. No, it's clutch then handbrake."

"That's what I did!"

"No, you did handbrake first."

"Oh, bite my fuckin' ass, Liam."

He smiled fondly. Yeah. He was just a kid who was particularly good at eavesdropping and remembering instructions. A kid who got his hours of practice in when he stole the car of some guy he bumped into at a party, just to bust the engine and ruin the treads. Bitch would think twice before spilling a beer on his bag next time.

It hadn't helped in any situation before this lesson. Definitely wouldn't have done anything to change the events of that night. Well, at least he was doing something with it now.

"Really though, the Bootlegger Turn is probs the one you'll use the most out of all the fancy moves you'll learn. If you ever get stuck in another traffic jam, you'll have it handled. Find a way around instead of just--"

He stopped himself. He didn't want another Angel. He didn't need another Marcus.

The words cut deeper than she wanted them to, and Siena couldn't stop her smile from faltering at the memories. All that red, and none of it sin. A moment of hesitation as she considered letting the unfinished sentence slide, as though she could pretend that she didn't know what Ernie was talking about, but the Arbiter knew better.

'You can say it if you want.' The words wouldn't come out. Hearing it from someone else again...she wasn't sure she could handle that. Not yet. Not after the night before. Instead, the smile had grown forlorn, a distant expression from what she'd felt earlier. "Y-yeah..." She refrained from saying "next time" even if she had already accepted that there would probably be one. She murmured quietly to herself as a reaffirmation. "No more mistakes."

Thankfully for Ernie, it didn't seem like he'd ruined everything with that comment. He chuckled with uncertainty.

"Yeah... well, I'm glad I could teach this to someone. And I'm glad it was you. Feels like I can finally pay you back for that piano lesson."

Considering how the last confrontations she had about the situation at DC had gone, Siena couldn't help but feel a sense of relief when it seemed that she might get away without trampling another relationship into the dust. Some of it leaked into her expression, she was sure, but still the girl returned her driving companion's statement with one of her own.

"Speaking of piano lessons, I thought I saw a piano here too." Was it really a wise idea? Would her fingers move without shaking, the notes come out without sounding too ragged and harsh? Siena couldn't honestly know. "Maybe we could take advantage of that."

Relief flooded his chest. Back to the way he wanted it to be. Ernie turned back to her with the smile he had on before, "Are you proposing swapping lessons every now and again? Cos I'd be super cool with that! I don't have much planned for this stay anyway."

"I almost feel like I'm cheating you with that trade," Siena claimed with a half restrained laugh. "But I'd be happy to trade lessons while we're here." In case they didn't get another chance later.

Aren't you trying to keep your mind off that?

"Heh, sounds good. You have my number so feel free to call me up whenever. Heck, I'll even sober up for the next one!"

Ernie sipped from a Blue Lagoon, absently wondering if he could wield multiple martini glasses at a time. Like Wolverine claws but, like, tasty. He snickered to himself. He'd need to patent that shit once they left the island.

A happily hummed tune echoed from the minibar as he began pouring himself another.

Allison Revel approached the jovial drunk, seemingly drawn in by the humming. It was one of the few times in the past week that the aberration had left her room, as if she was intentionally avoiding everyone. There was still something of that want for seclusion visible on her face, as she stared off at nothing in particular.

"Hey, Ernie." The words felt forced, though there was a visible attempt to keep them from being cold and lifeless. "How are you doing? Mind if I join you?" Allison wasn't exactly fond of drinking, especially considering what happened the last time she let alcohol into her system, but she knew she needed to loosen up.

At the sight of the brunette, Ernie willed his eyebrow to not raise itself instinctively. Brent had told him all about the recent developments between her and the Banshee, as you would. He had to say that he had expected more from the girl. Then again he'd expected more from all of his classmates. And look where that had got him.

So he grinned lazily instead.

"Getting there," he nodded to the girl, already opening up a bottle, "No probs, take a seat. You looking for something light or heavy tonight?"

"Light." Allison made her decision without hesitation as she sat down. Ernie was clearly drifting towards heavily drunk, if he wasn't far past that point already. Allison didn't find herself too concerned with his drunkenness, though. Getting herself to go and talk with someone that wasn't Angel instead of sitting alone in her room was enough of a task. "Last time I had anything heavy," or to drink at all, "I ended up throwing a mattress into a pool." The words brought Allison's mind back to DC, not exactly something she wanted to remember. She quickly fell silent.

"Daaamn. That's fucking wild. Got ourselves a party girl here, huh?"

"No, not really. Well, not when I'm sober, I guess." She found herself staring at the ground. "And I don't do much drinking."

Ernie peered at her carefully as he finished up the drink. It was a bit stronger than 'light'.

...

Okay, a lot stronger. But the girl seriously looked like she needed it. A red-colored martini slid her way. The high-end spirit should be hidden well under all the fruitiness.

"Fair enough. Sorry if I'm pokin' around too much buuttt..." the boy blinked, losing his train of thought briefly, "Oh yeah. Are you feelin' alright?"

Allison took up the glass, and looked at it for a moment. She took a small sip. It went down better than whatever it was that she had drank in DC, though she was still clearly not used to alcohol. She then contemplated the question for a moment.

"Fuck no," Allison said decidedly.

Ernie laughed, probably a lot harder than the comment deserved. Man, he needed to cut down on this shit when he was around people.

"Heh, yeah. Defs been there," he nodded to himself. He looked to Allison inquisitively, "Feel like talking about it?"

"Well, let me ask you a question first." She took a much larger sip of the drink. "Tell me, do you believe that truly good people exist?"

That caught him off-guard. Ernie blinked once more before chuckling nervously. He didn't even need to think about this one.

"Absolutely not. Why you askin'?"

"I think most of everyone else would answer the same way. Considering what's happened, there's no reason for any of us to hold any belief in the goodness of people. A healthy cynicism." She sipped at the drink again. "A part of me kept that idealism around, though. When everyone else focuses on themselves, I'm the one idiot still hoping that, maybe, just maybe, everyone isn't as awful as they seem. After what happened in DC..." A moment of silence passed and most of the drink went down. "I thought, maybe I should just kill that part of me. Every time I decided to put my trust in someone, any time I hoped for the best and assumed they would do something good, I always ended up wrong. I thought I could stop having to grieve and worry and get backstabbed all the time if I just gave up on people doing anything good. And then I realized what I would become." She finished the drink. "The same as every other fucked-up asshole here."

The buzzcut boy listened. Kept a carefully neutral expression on his face as he sipped absently from his own glass. But man, his blood gonna boil over any second. Another bridge would get burnt if he didn't keep his cards close to his chest.

Bitch thinks she's better than me, huh?

"And what," he chose his words like a defuser choosing which wire to cut, "does that mean exactly, the danger of being like the assholes here? You gotta keep the faith to be something better than that?"

"I'm not saying I'm better than anyone else," Allison protested. "I just..." Her word choice, at least, was pretty terrible. Calling everyone a fucked-up asshole wasn't going to do her any favors. "It's just don't think I could live like that." She gave herself a moment to think. Her original statement definitely sounded way more supremacist than she intended. "I just don't think I can give up that part of me, realistically. That naive, hopeful me is as much a reason to keep moving as it the reason I keep ending up in awful situations." A sigh escaped her lips, her eyes still examining the floor. "If anything, those fucked-up assholes are stronger people than I."

"If you know that it's naive then why keep it? Is there anything more to it than just being unable to give it up?"

"Like I said, I guess it's sort of my reason to live. If I keep going, at some point I'll find someone redeemable. Or, I'll die trying. I'm not going to just give up and lose to myself, I don't want things to end like that. That naivety is a reminder that no matter how fucked up things get, there will always be a light somewhere at the end of the tunnel. I just need to do all I can to reach that." At this point, Allison was slumped onto the counter. The alcohol was definitely getting to her. "It's probably not healthy or realistic, but it's better than nothing."

Surely there were better things to live for? Ernie fought the urge to chuckle as he pushed a tall glass of water to Allison. Quite a few lightweights in this class. These girls needed to be more careful. Plenty of people that would take advantage of that. Drinking some more from his own cocktail, he mulled over her words.

"Redemption, for me..." Though his tone was still light, his face turned solemn, "Redemption doesn't exist. I don't think 'good' and 'bad' are something people can just flip between."

" 'Good' isn't something you are. It's something you do. You don't really realise that until you've really plunged into the worst possible version of yourself. Until you're standing behind a bar, pouring a beer for a guy that was cleaning blood off his hands in the bathroom mere minutes ago. Watching him laugh with the brother he was protecting, completely ignoring all the lives he just took to defend his family. And you just...laugh with him. Geez, you would never believe how fucking human monsters can be."

A fresh glass of orange juice was poured. He didn't feel like drinking for this.

"Bad people do good all the time. And I'm not talking about good as in for their own interests. Real good. Taking in frightened kids. Making sure they can defend themselves. Banding together to fend off even bigger monsters than the ones they are. People are defined by their actions and actions can be 'good' with even the slightest amount of effort. So goodness can be found in everyone. But that doesn't do jack to erase what they've done. Redemption doesn't exist when there will always be a victim. Someone who's been crippled for life. Children orphaned by callous, murderous bastards. There will be always be someone that remembers."

Allison contemplated her friend's words for a few moments. There was certainly something poignant about them that the girl wanted to consider, but she was in the middle of being drunk. Either she was more of a lightweight than she thought, or that wasn't a "light" drink.

"I'll think abot et," was about all she could get to fall out of her mouth in response. Two things were busy crowding Allison's mind: her stigma, and how tired she felt. Well, she wasn't exhausted, but she felt as if a nap was the most appropriate response in the current scenario. The most tempting option her mind had come up with was to use Ernie as an impromptu pillow, as well as a few less sleep-oriented things. Those definitely seemed to take too much effort, so she opted to stay as she was. The counter became surprisingly comfortable when one was under the influence. "I juhs need a short nap."

The boy laughed again. Wayyy light. Though he was a bit miffed that all his words had been for little result, he couldn't help but quirk an eyebrow up at the drunk girl. "It's barely 10:30. Should I help you back to your room or something? Would be comfier than the counter."

Man, sleepy drunks were the boringest. But he still sort of considered Allison his friend so he digressed. The walk back was rather slow for his taste, a result of their varying levels of inebriation. Of course the buzzcut boy sobered up immediately at the sight of extra blankets and a guitar in the corner of the room. It took far too much effort to keep his face from souring.

"You, uh, rooming with someone?"

"Yeea." If Allison was sober to any extent, she might've noticed Ernie's reaction to Angel's things, but instead wrapped her arms around Ernie in a loose, drunken hug. "Thanks, Ernie. Yur a good friend."

The boy leaned back in surprise but otherwise simply chuckled in amusement. The hug was reciprocated with a brief squeeze and customary pats on the back before he stepped back.

"Need me for anything before I leave? Like more water?"

"No, no, I'm fine. Goodnight."

A nod and a wave as he moved to the door. He should have just left things as they were.

Should have. But he couldn't.

With his hand still on the doorknob, he turned and asked before he lost his nerve. "Why are you staying by Angelique? You knew what she did."

Allison's face hardened in that moment.

"You said even bad people are capable of doing good. Well, good people can do bad things." Allison swallowed hard, finding herself staring at the floor with her fists clenched. "Goodnight, Ernest." Allison grabbed the doorknob and pulled it closed.

It would have been easy to stick his foot in the door. To shove it back open and berate her over how obviously idiotic she was being. But that hadn't worked with Angelique. And 'easy' rarely meant 'right'.

Hesitation stole the moment and Ernie found himself facing a closed door, indignation and fury raising a fist to pound on the wooden panels in his stead. But the hand lowered as easily as it had risen once reason flooded its way back into his thoughts. The questioning had gone as well as it possibly could have. Better to have icy tensions than the flaming mess he'd created with the banshee.

Well. Forcing his beliefs had solved nothing. If Allison insisted on being knowingly naive then it wasn't his grave she was digging. This week had had him believing that forgiveness was something too virtuous for him to even come close to reaching. It was clear now that it was nothing more than fool's errand. Weakness and sheer stupidity. His stubbornness was justified after all.

Shaking his head, Ernie made his way back to the bar.

Interlude: Conviction

InkyHeartbeats: eventually it'll come around to either fighting around the clock or getting locked away

I won't die here.

”I’d rather see the whole fucking world die before someone from our class dies in front of me again.”

They won't get away with it again. I'll stop them all.

"We who remain here can only observe and wait."

How many others are out there waiting like her? I'll do it for them.

"Get to a computer and google 'USARILN West Reno task force.' Just...don't do it in front of anyone, including me."

'Trust'? You couldn't even look him in the eye.

"If I have to take action, I will."

I fear something terrible is going to happen.

"Well, good people can do bad things."

I wish I wanted to believe like she does.

”Ernie. Do you honestly think you belong here?”

The question left the thirteen-year-old speechless, an unspoken fear he’d harboured for years finally surfacing in his expression. If Owen knew the implications of what he just said then he didn’t show it.

“I mean, do you think these are good people?”

The child couldn’t answer that either. He’d seen them laugh and love and shelter young subnaturals who needed it. He’d watched them clean blood off their hands and chuckle with their friends mere minutes later. Lamplight seemed to glint through the man’s shoulder-length hair. He laughed warmly. Smiled the way only the strong could.

Because it was never really the height itself that was scary, right? Just the fear of splatting the wrong way after that stomach-flipping drop. Easily avoidable if you had the means and enough practice. The deer faunus examined her twin cudgels.

…

Yeaahhh, they wouldn’t be helping with any forest acrobatics any time soon. So ‘means’ was out of the picture. Considering that the tallest thing she’d been around for years was a particularly fortunate tree, ‘practice’ was very much off the list too.

Deep brown eyes surveyed the land before her. No visible Grimm, no clearing in sight, no landing strategy. Bleh. Guess she’d have to go buckwild right off the bat.

A roll of the shoulder punctuated her anxious irritation. Fine by her.

Bio: A child of the desert, Siusan was fortunate enough to be born in Vacuo to a Faunus couple hailing from Vale. She faced little discrimination for her race excluding the occasional schoolyard brawls that shaped the somewhat uncouth parts of her present personality. A survivor through and through, not afraid to beat down or get beaten down in the dog-eat-dog society of her Kingdom. Following a brief stint/expulsion from Vacuo’s primary combat school, Siusan transferred to Mistral’s famous Sanctum Academy, barely able to restrain herself from too many fights in order to graduate. From there, Beacon Academy became her next goal.

Semblance Name: Aillén Dé DanaanDescription of Semblance: An almost complete transferral of Aura to one of two functions: Attack or Defence. In Attack Mode Siusan’s strength reaches nearly unstoppable levels, giving her the ability to crush even a Goliath with her bare hands. Her senses are also heightened during this fervor. In Defence Mode her skin becomes impenetrable, her mobility slightly increased.Semblance Limitations: Both enhancements come at a great cost to Siusan’s body. Attack Mode drains her Aura almost completely. Even a single, solid punch to the Faunus would be enough to hospitalise her in this ‘enhanced’ state. Defense Mode inflicts the opposite, draining her of strength in her arms and dulling her senses. Both functions leave her incredibly fatigued at the end of their ten minute duration.

Weapon: Liath and Bodhmall – Two cudgels that combine into a hefty crossbow. At the ends of these weapons are leaden knobs that allow her to unleash devastating crushings unto her enemies. Siusan favours its dual wielded cudgel form, its weighty blows bringing her great satisfaction. They also make effective walking sticks in her often fatigued state. Due to her confrontational nature, the crossbow form is rarely used.Favoured Dust Element: Lighting and Fire

Bio: A child of the desert, Siusan was fortunate enough to be born in Vacuo to a Faunus couple hailing from Vale. She faced little discrimination for her race excluding the occasional schoolyard brawls that shaped the somewhat uncouth parts of her present personality. A survivor through and through, not afraid to beat down or get beaten down in the dog-eat-dog society of her Kingdom. Following a brief stint/expulsion from Vacuo’s primary combat school, Siusan transferred to Mistral’s famous Sanctum Academy, barely able to restrain herself from too many fights in order to graduate. From there, Beacon Academy became her next goal.

Semblance Name: Aillén Dé DanaanDescription of Semblance: An almost complete transferral of Aura to one of two functions: Attack or Defence. In Attack Mode Siusan’s strength reaches nearly unstoppable levels, giving her the ability to crush even a Goliath with her bare hands. Her senses are also heightened during this fervor. In Defence Mode her skin becomes impenetrable, her mobility slightly increased.Semblance Limitations: Both enhancements come at a great cost to Siusan’s body. Attack Mode drains her Aura almost completely. Even a single, solid punch to the Faunus would be enough to hospitalise her in this ‘enhanced’ state. Defense Mode inflicts the opposite, draining her of strength in her arms and dulling her senses. Both functions leave her incredibly fatigued at the end of their ten minute duration.

Weapon: Liath and Bodhmall – Two cudgels that combine into a hefty crossbow. At the ends of these weapons are leaden knobs that allow her to unleash devastating crushings unto her enemies. Siusan favours its dual wielded cudgel form, its weighty blows bringing her great satisfaction. They also make effective walking sticks in her often fatigued state. Due to her confrontational nature, the crossbow form is rarely used.Favoured Dust Element: Lighting and Fire

Perhaps in a better state of mind, she would have known that the danger was over, that the movement of the building was from a friend. That Allison had fallen unconscious, and would be unable to flee no matter how much 'encouragement' she offered. That there was nowhere else for them to go as the building floated above the city. As it was, Zoe absorbed none of that, only a sense of white-hot panic as their situation seemed to become even more precarious.

So she kept going, her breathing rapid and panicked. This was necessary, hurting them, if it meant they'd make it out alive. They couldn't fight something this powerful, she couldn't protect them. She'd be the last one alive again. It wasn't right. They had to leave-- Why wouldn't they leave?

"It's not safe here. You have to go, please, I don't want you to die--" Muttering just loudly enough to be heard, desperation to save them from a fight that she didn't realise was over. But there was laughter there too, the sick undercurrent of enjoyment that came with hurting those she cared for. This was the best way, they wouldn't leave if she just told them to, they never did. Efficiency, prioritising. That was the key, it was always the key. "Hurry up."

He had expected more. Though it would have been awful, he had expected so much more than just...

The gun dissolved in his hand, reduced to atomic dust, red, angry marks emerging, an imprint of what the gun once was. Before him, the crusher mage's head had vaporized, leaving a deep hole that a plume of flame jetted out from. The all too unnecessary third overclock.

And once the crusher mage was gone...

If the slime is up and the crusher is dead, we're fine.

Zoe was no longer needed.

Brent's eyes turned from the unconscious Allison to the blighted Gregory. Already, the slime's gelatinous mass was being crushed by a man who tossed mountains like baseballs. No contest now. They were done. All too easy. This was what he needed to do. Sacrifice blood and material wealth for victory. A deep sigh hissed out between his teeth as he clenched his burnt hand, relishing pain, revolted by agony. His left reached for the stun gun, silver circuitry once again overwriting the scientific limitations of the weapon.

"Alright," Brent replied, observing a distance of two meters. "Thanks for holding out as long as you did, Zoe."

At such a distance, he wouldn't miss, even if shooting with his left.

...

When Zoe fell over, Brent turned his smile towards Gregory.

"How's that stigma? Need me to knock you out as well?"

Tunnel vision kept Gregory from feeling the burning that crawled over his skin courtesy of Zoe, and even her words barely registered in his ears. Dangerous up here? They'd just given their position away. If the two didn't die here then, as morbid as it was, he'd rather Zoe send her rot straight through his head than suffocate while being melted alive in the slime.

The sight of success was enough for excitment to blot out the sensation of his skin, though relief once Kadabra joined in broke Gregory's focus. Slapping a hand over his burning back was a horrible idea as the squelch of broken down skin and flesh filled his ears along with an awful stench. To say nothing of the pain from touching an open and spreading wound. Stumbling to keep upright he fumbled around for the pile of firearms even as the entire building rumbled and rose. "You're the one kili-"

Stopping mid-yell as Zoe twitched from the delivered shock, Gregory glanced at Brent with a frown before he shook his head and sighed. "Yapping away as usual, but no." he muttered before gritting his teeth at the Precursor's words. Taking another deep breath as he glanced at the two unconscious Aberrations, his hand reached up to rub at his own X before he caught himself and stopped. Grumbling something underneath his breath, he tried to find some way to stand comfortably with a chunk of his upper body rotted raw.

"Got it," Brent nodded. A first aid kit would have been really helpful right about now, wouldn't it? Another oversight. If Zoe had gone a little too far with her magic, Gregory and Allison would have bled out by the time Kadabra delivered them to the evacuation point. He'd grown too dependent on thinking that healers could get them out of the situation. Hadn't Ernie carried such a kit with him basically everywhere? Had it available and knew how to use it?

Something new to learn then. When things finally quieted down? No, he had to do it as soon as possible. Gun training as well. There was no guarantee, after all, that they would even return to USARILN East now.

Not after the show Evacuation Group pulled off.

Shaking his head, Brent walked off, back towards the elevator shaft. Throughout the entire fight with the slime, the pleas for help from those within the stopped elevator hadn't stopped, a background ambience of terror that was easily overlooked in the heat of the moment. Now though? If Evacuation was so hellbent on completely destroying the public's trust in Unit B, he had to make up for that. Ensure that the Slime Team had some good rep, at least. Carve them out as the exception to the rule.

Arbitrarily approaching the steel doors, Brent placed his hand against the door and applied his power once more. Twice. Thrice. And on the fourth application, the door warped beyond repair, disintegrating beneath his grasp. And what laid behind that door? The regulars within, pressing themselves against the opposite wall, eyes wary and judgmental. They hadn't been a floor higher or a floor lower or stuck inbetween floors. They just had the fortune and misfortune of having the elevator stop as soon as they entered.

All too easy. He had expected more.

"W-wh-" One of the businessmen began, pale-faced at the sight of the armed subnatural.

"Ah," Brent smiled, "Don't worry, sir. All known threats have been dealt with by Unit B and Kadabra. I'm...Proteus, and we're currently being transferred t-"

A bespectacled woman, looking past him, gasped suddenly at the prone bodies of Allison and Zoe, as well as the flesh-rotten form of Gregory.

"-o the evacuation point," the arbiter continued, before stepping aside. "Feel free to make yourself comfortable. We'll be arriving shortly."

"Those people," the man began again, sliding past Brent as if he was trying to stay as far away from him as possible, "are they s-"

"My teammates," Brent cut in, continuing to smile genuinely and pleasantly, "The battle has been hard on them. Now, if you c-"

"Let us down." As if emboldened by the arbiter's relenting tone, an elderly individual spoke up. "I will not stand to be in the same building as the subnaturals that brought ruin to the city! Anyways, isn't that woman over there the lunatic that almost killed a reporter?"

Brent blinked, before shaking his head. "Ah, it's easy to get those two mixed up, but this isn't Zoe. And down below...well, that's a little..."

"What?"

"All known threats have been dealt with, but there's still the possibility of an unknown threat appearing, sir. That's why the Precursors are escorting you back. If my team makes you uncomfortable, feel free to relocate to one of the upper floors. The lower ones have been damaged during the conflict."

The old man narrowed his eyes. "No," he said, with a decisive shake, "If there're unknown threats, shouldn't you lot be down there looking for them? We should be escorted, not you! Take responsib-"

The amethyst-eyed youth sighed, pulled out one of three remaining guns, flicked the safety off, and...maintained his smile.

That shut the senile bastard up fast enough. The businessman who spoke up first had also broke out in cold sweat, while the remaining occupants of the elevator cab were quick to file out, avoiding eye contact as they went up the adjacent stairwell.

"Y-you aren't going to..." Alone now with a subnatural, bravery was in short supply, previous demands dying in his leathered throat.

With the few scraps of composure left in him, he shook his head, walking off as quickly as his knees could afford.

As that trembling back disappeared into the shadows of the stairwell, Brent flicked the safety on once more, a mixture of satisfaction and irritation boiling within him. Ah, that was a bit fun, at least. If Angelic hadn't been so murderous and threatening, perhaps he could have played the loose cannon archetype instead. Got some results from there. For now though, the brunette pulled up a swivel chair, sat down, and leaned back.

The throbbing of his right hand continued to gnaw at the back of his mind. Ambidexterity. He should learn that as well.

A figure in camouflage floated outside the window, ragdoll-like in his flight before he was dispensed onto the subnatural's floor. Ernie blinked, taking only a moment to regain his balance as he reached solid ground. Kadabra's fine control was no joke, huh?

With a sigh, the Aberration surveyed the room's unconscious inhabitants, eyes lingering first on Zoe, then Gregory and Allison's bleeding forms.

"What the fuck?" he grimaced. It sounded less like an exclamation and more like a genuine question as to what the hell had happened here.

"Oh, Ernie!" Brent hopped off from his seat, the wheels squealing as it spun away. "Glad you're around. Wouldn't happen to have a medkit on you, would you?"

"Huh?" Ernie looked up, still looking horrified from what he'd seen. Again? Why the fuck was Brent so casual about this? That sensation of paranoia returned briefly, though he shoved it away in favor of the current situation.

With one last withering glance at the redhead, Ernie nodded and unclipped the kit, starting to unpack it. "How did this even happen?"

"Zoe half-lost her mind and tried to force Allison and Gregory to run away after their job was done by using her power...gently?" The arbiter shrugged, before waving the blonde aberration over. "Anyways, it looks bad, but it's not life-threatening. Knocked her out before she could fully go off the rocker."

He paused, contemplative.

"Think she got better, compared to Wisford. But that might be optimistic."

"She could have fucked off herself, instead of trying to threaten people away," Ernie muttered, gesturing at Gregory to remove his shirt, "The Factory mission isn't a point of comparison any of us should be using. By that logic, a couple of melted thumbs would be better than Wisford. Doesn't change the fact that she's a fucking psycho."

His hands clenched around the roll of bandage. He was starting to run low, thanks to a certain ginger and her motel freakout.

"This class is full of nutjobs. Hazel and Sander... fuck, even Angelique."

The Senators at least took out any dissenters before they could cause more shit. What the fuck was he meant to do here with USARILN, where all the weapons of mass destruction had free reign to fuck up whatever they wanted? Ernie turned to Brent. There was too much in his furious expression, emotion that he didn't know how to release. Fear. Sadness.

Betrayal.

"You heard, right?"

Quirking a brow at Ernie's reaction, Gregory looked at Brent dubiously before nodding towards Allison instead. "No point in bandaging if we're getting Christmas'd or something in a bit. She probably hit her head on the way down though, didn't check."

He didn't disagree with Ernie's points either, but whatever he had to say on the matter would probably just piss the other Aberration off even further. Nutjobs and unhinged they might have been, but far too useful ones to simply get tossed aside. It didn't help that they'd only get worse until they became Animi if he wasn't remembering things wrong from the site either.

Tilting his head, Gregory leaned back against a table carefully and grimaced before asking, "Sounded like a bunch of crap was coming from the cuffs, but couldn't really pay attention to it. Did they run into a mob of panicked civilians or something?"

Ernie fiddled around, searching for his smelling salts. Probably wasn't a good idea to undress an unconscious girl without her permission. The memory was branded into his head and he breathed deeply as he recalled. "From what I saw, 'panicked civilians' probably is the best way to put it. There were... a lot, more than I could even count before Kadabra picked me up. Probably ganged up on the evac team. And all of them were just..."

Inhuman. The blood. The lifeless eyes. Fucking mounds of flesh that merely resembled the living. There was an unreasonable divide between life and death, one that made the boy's breath hitch uncontrollably. He hated seeing them.

"There were just so many, Ernie half-whispered, "Bleeding from their heads, their ears. Must have gotten their eardrums ruptured or some shit. Then there were a bunch that got crushed by fallen cars. That's not something you do to a Reg without aiming to kill. I don't...fuck, I don't know what they were thinking. I've never seen anything like that, anything so..."

Reckless. Vindictive. Excessive. Words he'd see on a vocab test and not on a list he'd use to describe the people he thought were his friends.

"Self-indulgent," he decided, practically spitting the word out.

Exhaling slowly as Ernie explained, Gregory glanced at the building's edge and won- Clicking his tongue as he caught himself, he couldn't bring himself to be too surprised at what had happened. It still sucked to see what sort of effect the aftermath had on the other Ab though, and he frowned as he had to strain his hearing to catch what was being said. Was it fortunate that his imagination was vivid enough to paint a scene for him just from the description he heard? Had they been trying to block off the civilians from getting to them, but dropped the cars when the situation had gotten out of hand?

Cutting his speculation short, Gregory was a bit taken aback by the heat in Ernie's voice, and he forced himself to stand up despite the pain and discomfort. "Don't think that's going a bit far?" He asked as he dropped himself into a chair that hadn't gone skidding out and pushed himself over.

Ernie gave the blond a strange look. He was the one going too far? His classmates had slaughtered dozens for...he didn't even know why. He couldn't even give them the benefit of the doubt and call it an accident.

He said none of it out loud. Instead, he turned back to Allison, sighing a resigned "I don't know. I don't know if I want to care anymore."

Sliding to a stop next to the two with a bit of a spin, Gregory ignored the way his back protested as he leaned against the backrest. "It is a lot easier to not give a damn," he agreed as he raised his left hand and stared at the splotches of decayed skin.

"This outcome was probably bound to happen with such a large group of subnaturals though, considering the fuss that was raised when we moved into town." Kadabra's control was steady enough that Gregory barely even moved as he started to ramble on a bit.

The discussion was interrupted by a pained groan as Zoe shifted, slowly pushing herself up into a sitting position.

The redhead looked disoriented, but fear seemed to override that as she got her bearings. Catching sight of her teammates, it became pure confusion - she barely even registered Ernie's presence. "You're okay?" It didn't make sense. They were still here, hadn't fled, but they were alive. It didn't seem that anything else had happened to them, beyond the patches of decay that littered their skin. Finally, without the haze of her stigma, she realised the danger had stopped long ago.

It had stopped the moment the slime died. Even as the corners of her mouth attempted to lift into a smile at the sight of her teammates, Zoe herself was disgusted. Again. She wasn't supposed to do it again. God, she wanted to vomit.

Damn it, why the fuck did they save me?

Zoe wasn't sure if the others had noticed her sitting up, but she glanced over regardless. For all her earlier conviction, the girl looked sickened at her own actions. Clenching her fist so the glass shards dug into her palm. There was a lot of blood seeping between her fingers, but it wasn't life-threatening. Her stigma wouldn't let her if it was. As the pieces seemed to come together, she spoke slowly. "No-one had to get hurt this time, did they? Not like before." Not like Wisford.

So Angelic had been involved as well.

No, that was a stupid thought. He knew she was involved. She literally screamed her threats over the cuffs, and there was no way in hell he could have mistaken those superpowered screams as something coming from anywhere else. How irredeemably dislikable. After going out of his way to offer her help, after she tried constantly to be a 'good Abe', after he twisted logic enough to temporarily absolve her of the full weight of the Montreal incident, after all that...

Hah. He didn't want to admit that someone he liked, someone he wanted to rise above just decided to walk off the edge all by herself. The way Ernie worded it, Evacuation Team sounded like they had all turned into terrorists. And here he was, more displeased with a friend's regression than the lives that such a mistake caused. Here he was, trying to think about how to turn things around instead of simply...feeling.

Brent forced himself to drop the smile that was about to emerge, eyes flickering to Zoe instead, warily reaching for the stun gun once more. Too little. Next would be two overclocks.

But the red-haired girl seemed calm, or at least disorientated enough to appear so.

"Wasn't bound to happen," Brent said, head tilting towards Gregory, "Someone could have stopped Angelic. There was Marcus there too. Kusari. Sophia. Lawrence. Siena. Grant. Lots of options. Who else..."

"If it was gonna make me bleed out, I wouldn't have been able to do it." Zoe's eyes were becoming clearer now; It seemed she knew where she was, at the very least. She still wasn't quite looking at the others as she reopened her fist and began to pull out the shards with a small smile that, given the whole situation, was ever-so-slightly creepy. "I mean that I didn't have to hurt you guys at all. Danger was over. Pointless."

The last word of the statement didn't just apply to her own actions, but what their classmates had done. It wasn't the body count that bothered her, rather how wasteful their attack must have been. But she should have expected it, shouldn't she? Angel had started listening to her, and maybe that was enough. Zoe chuckled, tossing aside a blood-coated glass fragment. "Whole thing's rotten, huh?"

"Yeah, would be nice if it didn't," Gregory agreed as he glanced between Brent and the now-awoken Zoe, "but mob mentality's a hell of a thing." It was probably a bit too callous to think of dozens dead as a "Play stupid games, win stupid prizes," sort of situation. Well, it was hard to make any real judgements without knowing both sides of the story.

"Situation's pretty much," he remarked offhandedly as he wondered the sort of fallout that was going to follow this whole incident. Would any of the others get thrown under the bus as a cost? Drumming his fingers atop the table, he fell silent as he watched the buildings pass by as Kadabra carried them along.

"Rotten."

That was another good word. And though Ernie stubbornly ignored all the self-awareness Zoe was displaying, he could at least agree with her on that.

" 'Soldiers will be waiting for us there and shoot us on sight'," he mused, talking bitterly and turning to the others, "What do you guys think? Is this class special enough to avoid a firing squad? Even Regulars have been executed for less."

"There are...chambers," Brent said, "underneath the hospital. They keep the more dangerous ones down there. Sedated and such. Probably as a last resort."

He let out a whistle, kicking away a shard of glass. A little cold? A little too pragmatic? A little too cruel, already envisioning a split in those within Unit B, those who proved themselves 'useful' and those who proved themselves 'dangerous'.

"I think we're in the clear," the arbiter said, gesturing to the general vicinity, "But I can imagine the others getting such treatment afterwards. Collared like Hazel, however much that would help, or even tossed into USARILN's dungeon. At least..."

He flinched. Was he so fine with imagining evacuation team being tossed underneath a bus and consigned to true imprisonment just because enough 'important' pieces, Sander, Callan, Chris, and Zoe, weren't involved in that incident?

"...that's better than death."

A prison within a prison, filled with the worst East could offer. Was it bad that Ernie admired Zhang's pragmatism in this moment?

They deserve it.

They did. But he wasn't going to voice it where everyone could hear. He chuckled morbidly instead.

"I guess hanging underground with a corpse-eater would be punishment enough. The smell's terrible."

"Least they won't be rooming with the kid. Dude has no idea how to organize his toybox."

Ernie's turn to be surprised.

"Wait, the corpse-eater is a kid? You've been down there?"

"Wait, how do you know about him if you haven't been down there?"

"Uh, Emma told us before the Factory mission. Reasons to not die or something like that," Ernie racked his brains. There was only one 'kid' he knew of at East. Something about 'clearing bodies' had been mentioned in the chatroom, "Don't tell me that Hector guy is the one."

"Yup, he is. Had some giant Tumor wannabe in the room with him as well. Paid him a visit like, on my second night or so in USARILN with Emma, and I'm pretty sure that made her bonkers."

Emma and Brent hung out? And he also knew that she was a secret ass? Oh, thank god. Ernie's weak smile broke wider. Man, this whole ordeal had made him stupidly desperate for normal conversation. He sat facing the windows, watching the city go by.

"Hey, how come you got the VIP tour? I was dragged off the truck and into a calculus class on my first day!"

Brent scratched the back of his head, recalling those unpleasant and embarrassing details. "Man, it's a super silly story now that I think about it, but it's like...Emma wanted to know where people went when they died, and I had nothing better to do, so I asked around a bunch and we more or less lucked out with meeting this guy called Clark. He knew where to go, lead us there, and BAM, underground cells carrying crazy kids."

"Probs woulda gotten more, if Emma hadn't started laughing maniacally and got us both tazed." Brent shrugged. "Woke up in a cell just in time for Freddie to come and smacktalk us for being curious. And from that day on, I'm pretty sure Emma wants me to slip down a flight of stairs and impale myself on an umbrella."

"Seriously? Dude, she said she'd let me die if it came down to another fight with rogue mages. Like not even in a joking way."

Ernie wondered if this was in violation of their ceasefire, telling this to not only Brent but Zoe and Greg too. But even then he couldn't say he cared too much. He was just glad someone else, Brent especially, saw Emma for who she really was. The others would have found out in their own time anyway, if she was truly as 'bonkers' as Brent was claiming.

"I don't know how to act around her. She might be nice sometimes but...man, that good girl shit reeks."

"Wait, this was after Wisford? Geez, that's pretty fucking nasty, considering all the shit that went down." Brent shook his head, surprised that anyone would have said something like that after what had happened to Savannah. "Really hoping that Marcus doesn't get screwed over by her. Dude deserves hella more than a bipolar weakling."

A loaded pause, as Ernie's thoughts flickered to Cal, then to the scarred Arbiter. Sure, Marcus was a dummy for dating Emma but...

Those trigger-happy bastards deserve each other.

Nah, interfering with relationships was...it wasn't good, right? Marcus and Cal were his friends. And Emma was sort of one too...?

Thoughts for another time. For now, Ernie managed a small laugh. "Heh...yeah, for real."

"Mhmm. Maybe a miracle will happen," Brent said, turning towards the cityscape that had become so distorted. "But I'm not holding my breath."

His hands stuck themselves in the pockets of his dark trousers, churchwear out of place with military hardware.

"Least she's not as irredeemable as Chris."

"Oh really?" Ernie quirked an eyebrow. A full-blown gossip session over the battered remains of a metropolis. This was happening now? Not that he was complaining. He welcomed it. Anything to block out what he'd seen, "He didn't go on a punching spree, did he?"

"Naw, not talking about that," Brent said, waving off that particular incident. He scratched his chin, thinking for a moment about the ramifications of sharing such details, before deciding that, yeah, of course he was going to bitch about it.

"He got me in the buffet room and basically told me to back off from Siena...but the scaly bastard doesn't even have the balls to ask her out in person! Like, nevermind the fact that I only like her, but holyyyy, I swear. Dude almost makes Emma sound like a saint! And hell! Thought he had hots for Angelic the entire time!"

Not asking someone out in person? Ernie was far from an expert on these things but that did seem kinda shady. Easy to lure someone out and scam them that way.

"Isn't there some kind of 'all's fair' rule for this stuff?" Ernie wondered out loud. Never mind the Angelique stuff, he wanted to hear how his friend dealt with a loser like this, "Did you kick his ass at least? The guy's built like a plastic straw."

"Pretty sure I could just bend his back over my knee and snap him, yeah," Brent laughed, "But I wanted to give him a chance, you know? So I told him where Siena was staying and all. Dared him to confess right there. Thought I'd light a fire up his ass and get him to man up...and you know what ends up happening instead?"

Ernie's eyes lit up. "Aw, this is gonna be good."

"I come up a couple minutes later, and the dude's left a letter there instead!"

Brent raised his hands up, gesticulating in exasperation.

"There was a comfy ass sofa he coulda sat his skinny shithole on, but apparently the dude's so busy being a grungy snake that he couldn't even just wait for Siena to come back! Probably creamed himself in relief when he realized that she wasn't there, so he could take the bitch-route and fuck off into a closet instead."

Yeah, this was so much better than thinking about a future where evacuation team got punished for all the crap they pulled.

"Just...gah! Is it weird that I'm making such a big deal of it or something, Ernie?"

It wasn't. Ernie knew this jig they were dancing well. A big, fat distraction. It was working fantastically.

"Nothing weird about looking out for a friend, dude," he shrugged after failing to hold in his laughter at Brent's exasperation, "I don't think a guy that can't even ask someone out properly can handle an actual relationship. It's Siena's problem to deal with at the end of the day.

He snickered, mischievousness rising. "If we're being honest here, I wouldn't've thought the guy who strips naked to use his power would get embarrassed so easily. But the world's a weird place," A grin before something occurred to him. "Sayyyy, how did you even find out about the letter, you sly bastard?"

"Oh, that?" Brent's grin widened, all toothy and a little bit mean-spirited, "Siena and I have like, real fucked up sleeping schedules, so I basically roomed with her. How else do you think I knew her room number?"

The Aberration's eyebrows rocketed up with glee. He gave the Arbiter a playful punch on the shoulder. "Awww shit, you really are sly! So did she end up reading it?"

"I mean, it wasn't even planned...but it certainly was lucky," Brent said, before scoffing at Ernie's later statement. "And of course she didn't read it. No way in hell I gave Chris a chance to man up, only for him to use purple prose to poetically propose his passion."

"He...no way, he didn't write a poem, did he?"

"I'll leave it to your imagination~"

As Zoe finally pulled the last shard from her palm, she listened to the others' conversation with interest. What she heard actually surprised her slightly, though she didn't really care about the pair being discussed. Or more accurately, she had an idea of them, and she didn't think she liked it much. But nonetheless, she was surprised as she finally - properly - noted Ernie's presence along with the conversation topic. It annoyed her, but as their talk seemingly reached a conclusion, part of Zoe knew it would be better to keep her mouth shut.

She very rarely listened to that part.

"Thought you and Emma would've gotten along, Ernie." Words came out before she could stop them, what little filter Zoe had lost somewhere in the mess of blood and pain. "You've got a lot in common. Hiding, running away, letting everyone else do your jobs for you..."

Ernie blinked, turning to the redhead with an eyebrow raised. He didn't recall ever messing with her, or hearing of any news of her disputes with Emma. "And what's that supposed to mean?"

The redhead glared at him, her irritation apparent. What, was he playing dumb now? "Let's start with Wisford, seeing as you're so hung up on that. You didn't actually give a damn about helping anyone - practical concern? Bullshit. You just wanted to run away. Yeah, I hurt Callan, because the others just sat there watching, because lives were on the line and every second mattered. Seconds that you made me waste because you couldn't stand the idea of having no-one to hide behind."

"I didn't hear you with any of the other groups, either. Probably spent this fight doing the same thing. But you know what really pisses me off? Lily." Zoe's tone was level, and that was perhaps more dangerous than her usual ferocity. Struggling to her feet, she glared at Ernie. "Lily didn't know who did that to me. Lily probably lay there wondering if we were being preyed on by god-knows-what, because Emma was too busy trying to run away, and you couldn't even make sure she knew what was going on. And don't tell me there wasn't time, because you sure as hell had time to tell her to change her fucking shirt."

"She...didn't know?" Ernie paled in disbelief at her complete lack of situational awareness. Another talk he needed to have after. As for the rest...

"That...that's not even my fault, okay? I asked Emma to check on her because I was cleaning up the mess caused by your bullshit. Hell, she was the one that brought her in the first place. How was I supposed to know she didn't know? Take that shit up with with her; I'm the one who stuck around to actually try to fix things. And what? You think I was gonna let an Aberration walk around a motel swarmed with USARILN guards in blood-covered clothes?!"

He honestly hadn't even considered that at the time. It was just damn gross.

"She's more unstable than you'd believe. I'm sure the guards have files on that shit so they wouldn't have hesitated to take her out and poke around to see who she fucking maimed. So don't try to shove that on me. And don't you dare say I don't give a damn."

Ernie got to his feet too. Slight mistake. Zoe was a few inches taller and built like a freaking panther. But he kept his resolve. She wasn't completely wrong but she wasn't going to know that.

"I held you back because I'm not stupid enough to let a classmate who'd probably never been a mage fight enter an outnumbered match. And you know what? It's honestly funny because back in that shithole you actually had me convinced that you cared. You were begging to help and then the next thing I know, Cal almost bleeds to death and then this happens!" He gestured wildly at Gregory and Allison.

"I might have retreated but the only wrong decision I made back there was not holding you back longer and knocking your ass out before you hurt any of my friends."

"You think I don't care? Fuck you."

Zoe shook her head. In a way, he was right, but not how he thought. It wasn't that she didn't care to help them, didn't care to stop hurting them-- It was that she didn't know how. Because the only way anything ever got done was with brutality, and to think otherwise was naive. Wrong. It had to be wrong.

"You know what I saw when I got to that battlefield? I saw my classmates floating above a fucking deathtrap and Lawrence, one of the only people who tried to help me, with a hole straight through him. I didn't know if he was alive or dead. The kid was already gone, and the others weren't stopping it." Zoe looked frustrated, and it bled through to her tone. "Yeah, I'd do it differently if I had the chance. But at least I did something, and that's more than I can say for you."

"I'm not gonna spend my life begging for forgiveness, so think what you like. You probably only care so long as you're losing people to hide behind, you cowardly piece of shit." Perhaps that was paranoid, thinking the worst of people so easily. But you judged others by your own standards. "None of this was for my sake, none of it was just because I felt like it. Have I screwed up? Yeah. Am I fucked in the head? No-one knows that better than I do. But whether you believe me or not, I've been trying to protect you guys."

This was pointless. He'd already revealed more than he wanted to about Lily. Made big claims he couldn't take back. It was pointless because everything they were throwing at each other were truths that weren't going to fix either of them. He knew he was a fucking coward and he knew that he'd been hiding since the day Devon shoved a mop into his hands. What the fuck did she want from him?

Ernie grit his teeth as she ranted. This bitch clearly didn't know how to face anything in a way that didn't involve rushing in headfirst. So fucking stupid. All her cards were on display and she didn't even care. He'd seen that desperation, that determination at Wisford. He was seeing it now. So when Zoe declared that she'd been protecting them, Ernie scoffed. Because what was the fucking point?

Despite everything, he knew what a Stigma could do to someone. He just knew that despite her actions and unlike him, Zoe was a shitty liar. So he believed her. And he hated that. Because what would his opinion change?

"Then start acting like it," he said curtly, the heat having left his words, "Keep that shit directed at the monsters and Ground Zero folks. Maybe someone else would believe you then."

"I'm not sure it'd be a good thing if they did." Because then they'd start to trust her. They might start to care. They'd be vulnerable, exposed, and all it would take was one slip. Bursting veins. A torn out throat. The shuddering, whimpering body of someone that thought they loved her, bundled in a too-large coat. "Truth is..."

I'm scared. I don't want to be like this.

I'm strong. I did what had to be done.

Cowardice. Conviction. Neither were voiced. Instead, she sighed, speaking as though it were the easiest thing in the world to understand. "Someone has to play the villain, and people like me don't get happy endings. Thought I could keep the others from ending up the same." Hurt crept into her voice, remembering what their teammates had done. A bitter laugh. "Fat lot of good that did."

He looked at her impatiently. This was something too familiar, someone he knew driving themself into a corner. Stupid.

"Obviously your villain act isn't up to scratch," he remarked, "No one here was willing to shoot you through the torso so that's a no-go."

She did care. To the point of losing herself, which was more than Ernie could ever say for himself.

"Look. There are people here who...give a shit," He didn't include himself in that group but that wasn't important here. "They don't want you getting hurt, especially if you're doing it to yourself. That's why we're all in this building here, right? We're gonna learn from this. We're gonna talk instead of running around in circles next time and if it's distance you actually need then you'll get it."

Internally, he laughed at himself. What hypocritical shit was he going on about now?

"In my experience, trying to decide who deserves a happy ending only ends up making everyone want it more. There's no need to think about it so hard. You care too much to play the villain anyway. No way you're winning any Oscars with that."

It was a shame he couldn't say the same for the evacuation team. They really had him fooled.

"That probably makes me more dangerous, not less. If I didn't care, I'd probably be a lot better at looking after you guys. Passion's unpredictable." Her ruthlessness wasn't born from detachment, but protectiveness. And that meant that she wouldn't let go of them. That she'd happily paint a city in blood if it meant they'd survive another day. "Sometimes caring means you do what you have to do. Carrying the burdens. Pulling the trigger."

No, caring didn't stop her from being a monster. "The road to hell, isn't it? If I didn't give a damn, it'd be a lot easier." Zoe sighed. Fact was, she wasn't worth shit. Only violence, only destruction. And if she couldn't destroy herself to keep them safe, she was more than happy to let the world destroy her in their place. Her gaze flitted to Gregory, and then Allison. "I'm not really someone you want caring for you."

"You don't always have to be the one to make that decision," Ernie replied, "But I guess you're right. Sounds like a lot less work when you've run out of shits to give. Unfortunately for yourself, you don't seem like the type to take the easy road at all."

He looked away. This was too familiar.

"Looking after people without caring, huh? Not many people can manage that."

He was probably right. And she knew she couldn't stop herself from caring far too much. For a brief second, Zoe looked as though she wanted to say more, but eventually settled on silence.

"Are you all done?" A cold, tired voice eminated up from the crumpled form of Allison Revel. She felt as if she had just been hit by a truck, all the energy drained from her body leaving her in an exhausted pile on the ground. She had been lying there for what felt like forever, not exactly sure when she rose back into consciousness, though it had seemed that no one had noticed when she did, as their gossiping and arguing must have been very important. "Can someone please help me up?" It took her a moment to get out the words between laboured breaths.

"Yeah," Brent offered a hand, glancing over at the silent Ernie and Zoe duo, "You feeling alright now? Or still dead on the inside?"

"I'm fine," Allison said before grabbing Brent's hand and lifting herself off the floor, wincing at the sharp pain that flew over her back as she did. She shrugged off his comment and tried to stand on two wobbly legs, using Brent to balance herself. Her back was on fire, the pain only compounded by her exhaustion. She refrained from looking at the others, finding the floor to be a more welcoming sight. She had too many things to focus on. The pain, her exhaustion, Zoe's actions, their victory, and everything she had just heard. None of this had to happen. "I'm fine," she quietly repeated, moving away from Brent, her legs just stable enough to carry her.

Oh, this was familiar, wasn't it? Brent's eyes narrowed, before pulling a chair over. Allison, what were her relationships with Evacuation Team again? He couldn't recall much of anything, but he also doubted that she had absolutely no friendships within that group of civilian-crushers. "Who're you trying to convince here? Yourself?" he said, not unkindly, "Take a seat at least. Deserve a break after the shit you managed to do."

"Thanks." Allison muttered, lowering herself into the seat. She took a moment to gauge her surroundings, something that her place on the ground had not allowed her to do. The building was, indeed, being lifted towards the evac point. It was probably the least important piece of information she had gained in the past few minutes. She had somehow earned a front row seat to the "People with Awful Morals" convention, listening to people she should be able to call allies tear each other apart. And Angel... Allison didn't want to believe it, but if it was true, then she was as right as ever. Good people don't exist. How often would she learn that lesson?

Allison shrunk down in her silence, leaning forward in the chair, resting her arms on her legs. Maybe it was just a dire situation, maybe an accident. Allison gave Ernie a second chance, so why not Angel? That didn't matter, not right now. Personal romantic trouble could be dealt with later, no matter whether murder was involved or not. What about the civilians? What was being done about those caught in the chaos? Likely nothing, if previous events were anything to go by. Allison's mind floated back to being surrounded by monsters disguised as people. A stupid, idealistic girl had no place in this world. In the end, all Allison really knew was that her back hurt.

The grim quiet seemed to spread throughout the room, it's occupants patiently awaiting the arrival at their destination.